Division' 


DS745 

.H45 


Section 


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THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY 
OF  CHINA 

TO  THE  END  OF  THE  CHOU  DYNASTY 


FRIEDRICH  HIRTH,  Ph.D. 

PROFESSOR  OF  CHINESE,  COLUMBIA  UNIVERSITT 
IN  THE  CITY  OF  NEW  YORK 


Netn  gorit 

THE  COLUMBIA  UNIVERSITY  PRESS 
1908 


All  rights  reserved 


Copyright,  1908, 

By  the  COLUMBIA  UNIVEK8ITT  PRESS. 


Set  up  and  electrotyped.  Published  January,  1908. 


Noriuaol)  19re«s 

J.  S.  Cushing  Co.  — Berwick  & Smith  Co. 
Norwood,  Mass.,  U.S.A. 


3E0 


HORACE  W.  CARPENTIER 


“ Hier  muss  ich  noch  einer  Eigenthumlichkeit  meiner  Handlungsweise  gedenken.  Wie 
sicli  in  der  politischen  Welt  irgend  ein  ungeheures  Bedrohliches  hervorthat,  so  warf  Ich 
niich  eigeusinnig  auf  das  Entfernteste.  Dahin  1st  denu  zu  rechneu,  dass  ich  von  meiner 
Kuckkehr  aus  Karlsbad  an  mich  mit  ernstlichstem  Studium  dem  chinesischen  Reich  wid- 
mete.  . . 

— Goethb,  Tag-  und  Jahrea-Uefte,  1818. 


On  November  10,  1813,  Goethe  said,  in  a letter  addressed  to  K.  L.  von 
Knebel : 

‘‘Besonders  habe  ich  China  und  was  dazu  gehort,  fleissig  durchstudirt.  Ich  habe  mir 
dieses  wichtige  Land  gleichsam  aufgehoben  und  abgesondert,  um  mich  im  Fall  der  Noth, 
\vie  es  auch  jetzt  gescbeben,  dahin  zu  ddchten.  Sich  in  einem  ganz  neuen  Zustande  auch 
nur  in  Gedanken  zu  befinden,  ist  sehr  heilsam.” 


— Gobtub’s  Werke,  ed.  W.  von  Biedermann,  xxvii,  480. 


PREFACE 


When,  in  1813,  about  the  time  of  the  battle  of  Leipzig, 
patriotic  cares  preyed  upon  his  soul,  Germany’s  great 
poet,  Goethe,  took  refuge  in  the  history  of  China.  The 
novelty  of  the  study  and  the  very  diversity  of  the  subject 
had,  we  may  conclude  from  his  own  words,^  a salutary 
effect  on  his  mind. 

The  century,  or  nearly  so,  which  has  elapsed  since  the 
time  when  Chinese  subjects  were  the  Ultima  Thule  in  that 
wide  range  of  scientific  industry  characteristic  of  one  of 
the  world’s  most  universal  minds  has  wrought  a wonder- 
ful change  in  public  interest. 

Political  events  have  brought  China  to  the  front ; and 
the  Western  world  is  now  more  than  ever  bent  on  study- 
ing the  civilization  of  that  once-neglected  empire  — un- 
fortunately often  with  ill  success.  It  is  the  universal 
complaint  among  Westerners  — and  those  who  have  had 
the  longest  experience  in  studying  Orientals  are  the  most 
ready  to  admit  the  fact  — that  we  shall  scarcely  ever  be- 
come as  familiar  with  the  Chinese  as  we  are  with  nations 
nearer  to  ourselves  in  race  and  culture.  This  complaint 
will  probably  never  cease  to  be  justified,  but  it  may  be 
considerably  attenuated. 

Students  wishing  to  know  something  about  China  often 
believe  they  have  done  enough  if  they  have  read  a book 
of  modern  travel  or  one  on  recent  politics.  They  re- 
semble the  amateur  traveler  in  Italy  who  thinks  he  may 
1 See  the  quotations  ante. 
vii 


VIU 


PREFACE 


learn  to  know  the  country  without  troubling  himself 
about  the  history  of  Rome.  Having  started  at  the  wrong 
end,  as  it  were,  they  will  never  realize  that  many  of  the 
oddities  and  puzzles  encountered  in  the  attempt  to  under- 
stand the  modern  Chinese  disappear  if  we  can  trace  their 
historical  origin  and  development.  In  this  respect  the 
China  of  to-day  is  unique  as  compared  with  all  other 
countries.  No  other  people  in  the  world  is  so  closely 
connected  with  its  ancient  history  as  the  Chinese,  and  of 
this  the  earliest  part,  with  that  classical  Chou  dynasty, 
the  constitutional  period  of  all  Chinese  culture,  has 
created  standards  which  have  become  dominant  in  all 
development  down  to  our  own  times,  not  only  in  China 
herself,  but  to  a certain  extent  throughout  the  Far  East, 
especially  in  Corea  and  Japan.  The  ancient  history  of 
China  in  this  respect  holds  a position  in  the  extreme  East 
similar  to  that  of  Greece  and  Rome  in  the  West. 

Such  considerations  had  induced  the  author  to  pre- 
pare lectures  on  the  subject  addressed  to  such  university 
students  as  did  not  intend  to  become  specialists  in  the 
language  and  literature  of  China.  This  necessitated  the 
elimination  from  them  of  the  purely  philological  element. 
On  the  other  hand,  the  present  state  of  research  in  sub- 
jects of  Chinese  history  and  culture  called  for  the  inser- 
tion of  results  which  might  have  necessitated  much  deeper 
argumentation  in  matters  of  detail  than  the  chief  object 
in  view  would  justify.  The  author  has,  therefore,  en- 
deavored to  steer  a middle  course  by  referring  students 
to  the  foreign  literature,  leaving  it  to  them  to  extend  their 
knowledge  by  studying  these  sources.  It  should  be 
understood,  however,  that  merely  a selection  from  the 
enormous  material  existing  in  the  shape  of  translations, 


PREFACE 


IX 


monographs,  and  comprehensive  works  is  here  presented. 
A complete  bibliography  of  the  foreign  literature  will  be 
found  in  Henri  Cordier’s  “Bibliotheca  Sinica:  Diction- 
naire  bibliographique  des  ouvrages  relatifs  a I’empire 
chinois  ” (2d  edition,  Paris,  1904,  under  the  head  of 
“ Histoire  ” ; some  of  the  collateral  subjects,  such  as 
archaeology,  art,  etc.,  being  dealt  with  in  other  sections 
of  the  work).  The  Sinological  reader  may  dispense  with 
a whole  library  of  works  constituting  the  native  sources 
of  our  subject  by  referring  to  that  huge  collection  of 
historical  extracts,  the  I-shi,  in  160  books  compiled  by 
Ma  Su  and  published  in  1670  — a veritable  mine  of  infor- 
mation and  a monument  of  methodical  treatment  remind- 
ing one  of  Kaspar  Zeuss’s  unique  work  “ Die  Deutschen 
und  die  Nachbarstamme.”  (Cf.  Wylie,  “Notes  on  Chinese 
Literature,”  Shanghai,  1867,  p.  23.) 

To  my  students  is  due  my  thanks  for  having  listened 
to  these  Lectures  with  never-failing  interest  during  four 
consecutive  academic  years,  — a source  of  much  encour- 
agement to  the  lecturer,  considering  that  the  course  lay 
through  paths  so  very  far  from  the  beaten  track.  Their 
publication  as  a text-book  for  students  and  as  a work 
of  reference  for  general  readers  is  due  to  the  liberality  of 
the  Trustees,  Dr.  Nicholas  Murray  Butler,  President  of 
Columbia  University,  ex  officio  President,  and  Professor 
William  H.  Carpenter,  Secretary,  of  the  Columbia  Uni- 
versity Press,  and  the  cooperation  of  the  Norwood 
Press.  I have  also  to  thank  Mr.  Albert  Porter  of 

Livingston,  Staten  Island,  N.Y.,  for  the  conseientious 
manner  in  which  he  has  revised  the  manuscript  for  the 
press. 

FRIEDRICH  HIRTH. 

Columbia  University  in  the  City 
OP  New  York,  March,  1907. 


CONTENTS 


PAOIS 

Preface vii 

Instructions  for  Reading  Chinese  Words  . . . . xv 

I 

Mythological  and  Legendary 1-26 


§ 1.  The  Fabulous  Cosmogony;  P’an-ku,  etc.  — § 2.  Fu-hi 
(2852-2738  b.c.).  — §3.  Shon-nung  (2737-2705  b.c.). — 

§4.  Huang-ti  (2704-2595  b.c.). — § 5.  Supposed  intro- 
duction of  a foreign  civilization  under  Huang-ti. — 

§ 6.  Further  deeds  of  Huang-ti.  — § 7.  Shau-hau  (2594- 
2511  b.c.).  — § 8.  Chuan-hu  (2510-2433  b.c.).  — § 9.  Ti- 
k’u  (2432-2363  b.c.).— § 10.  Ti-chi  (2362-2358  b.c.). 

II 

The  Confucian  Legends 27-44 

§ 11.  Yau  (2357-2258  B.c.).  — § 12.  Shun  (2258-2206  b.c.). — 

§ 13.  The  Hia  dynasty  (2205-1766  b.c.).  — § 14.  Yii,  or 
Ta-yti  (2205-2198  b.c.).  — § 15.  Yii’s  successors  (2197- 
1766  B.C.). 


Ill 

The  Shang,  or  Yin,  Dynasty  (1766-1122  b.c.)  . . 45-91 

§ 16.  Ch’ong-t’ang  (1766-1754  b.c.).  — §17.  Ch’ong-t’ang’s 
successors.  — § 18.  Chdu-sin.  — § 19.  Won-wang,  Duke  of 
Chou.  — § 20.  Wu-wang  and  the  fall  of  the  Shang  dynasty. 

— § 21.  Culture  of  the  Shang  period. 

xi 


XU 


CONTENTS 


IV-VIII 

PAGES 

Thk  Ch(5u  Dynasty  (1122-249  b.c.)  ....  93-328 


IV 

From  Wu-wang  to  K’ang-wang:  the  Period  of  Impe- 
rial Authority 93-139 

§ 22.  Wu-wang  as  King  of  Chou  (1122-1116  b.c.). — 

§23.  Ch’ong-wang  (1115-1079  b.c.).  — §24.  The  “Chdu- 
li.”  — § 25.  Origin  of  the  mariner’s  compass  in  China.  — 

§ 26.  Ch’ong-wang’s  reign  continued.  — § 27.  K’ang-wang 
(1078-1053  B.C.). 


/ V 

Gradual  Decline  of  Central  Power  ....  141-197 

§ 28.  Chau-wang  (1052-1002  b.c.).  — § 29.  Mu-wang  (1001- 
947  B.C.).  — § 30.  Kung-wang  (946-935  b.c.). — § 31.  I- 
wang  (934^910  b.c.).  — § 32.  Hiau-wang  (909-895  b.c.). 

— § 33.  I-wang  (894-879  b.c.).  — § 34.  Li-wang  (878- 
842  B.C.).  — § 35.  The  Kung-ho  period  (841-828  b.c.). — 

§ 36.  Siian-wang  (827-782  b.c.).  — § 37.  Yu-wang  (781- 
771  B.C.).  — § 38.  P’ing-wang  (770-720  b.c.). — § 39.  Geog- 
raphy of  the  Ch’un-ts’iu  period  (722-481  b.c.).  — 

§40.  Huan-wang  (719-697  b.c.). 


VI 

The  Century  of  the  “Five  Leaders”  (685-591  b.c.).  199-223 

§41.  Chuang-wang  (696-682  b.c.).  — § 42.  Hi-wang  (681- 
677  B.C.).  — § 43.  Hui-wang  (676-652  b.c.).  — § 44.  Siang- 
wang  (651-619  b.c.).  — § 45.  K’ing-wang  (618-613  b.c.). 

— §46.  K’uang-wang  (612-607  b.c.).  — §47.  Tiug-wang 
(606-586  B.C.). 


CONTENTS  xiii 


VII 

PAGES 

The  Age  of  Lau-tzi  and  Confucius  ....  225-257 

§48.  Kien-wang  (585-572  b.c.).  — § 49.  Ling-wang  (571- 
545  B.C.).  — § 50.  King-wang,  the  elder  (544-520  b.c.). — 

§ 51.  King-wang,  the  younger  (519-476  b.c.). 

VIII 

The  Contending  States 259-328 

§ 52.  Ytian-wang  (475-469  b.c.).  — § 53.  Chon-ting-wang 
(468-441  B.C.).  — § 54.  K’au-wang  (440-426  b.c.). — 

§ 55.  Wei-li6-wang  (425-402  b.c.).  — § 56.  An-wang  (401- 
376  B.C.).  — § .57.  Lie-wang  (375-369  b.c.).  — § 58.  Hidn- 
wang  (368-321  b.c.).  — § 59.  The  philosophers  Yang  Chu 
and  Mo  Ti.  — § 60.  Mencius.  — § 61.  Chuang-tzi. — 

§ 62.  Minor  Philosophers.  — § 63.  Su  Ts’in  and  Chang  I. 

— § 64.  Shon-tsing-wang  (.320-315  b.c.).  — § 65.  Nan- 
wang  (314-256  b.c.).  — § 66.  The  “Four  Nobles.”  — 

§ 67.  The  leadership  of  Ts’in  (256-221  b.c.). 


APPENDIX:  Chronological  Tables  ....  329-348 
INDEX 349-383 


Sketch  Map  of  China  during  the  Ch6u  Dynasty  . 360 


I 


INSTRUCTIONS  FOR  READING  CHINESE 
WORDS  IN  THIS  WORK 

Readers  need  not  trouble  too  much  about  the  pronun- 
ciation of  the  Chinese  words  occurring  in  this  volume. 
They  should  regard  them  as  mere  symbols  for  certain 
Chinese  characters  transcribed  in  the  Mandarin  dialect. 
Since  the  sounds  attached  to  the  characters  of  the  Chinese 
written  language  vary  considerably  in  the  several  prov- 
inces, and  even  in  the  Mandarin  dialect  itself,  it  should 
be  understood  that  merely  an  approximation  of  the  true 
sounds  as  heard  in  the  north  of  China  is  aimed  at.  The 
phonetic  principles  on  which  sounds  are  here  described 
correspond  in  spirit  to  those  adopted  by  the  Royal  Geo- 
graphical Society  of  London  ^ and  the  United  States  Board 
on  Geographic  Names.^  According  to  these  principles, 
vowels  are  to  be  pronounced  as  in  Italian  and  on  the 
continent  of  Europe  generally,  and  consonants  as  in  Eng- 
lish. But  for  the  special  purpose  of  rendering  Chinese 
sounds  certain  rules  involving  some  slight  modifications 
are  here  given. 

Vowels  and  Diphthongs 

a has  the  sound  of  a in  father.  Examples:  wa, 
horse ; sha,  sand  ; wan,  bay ; shan,  mountain  ; 
nan,  south. 

1 See  Buies  for  the  Orthography  of  Geographical  Names,  published  by 
the  Council  of  the  Royal  Geographical  Society,  1891 . 

* See  Second  Beport  of  The  United  States  Board  on  Geographic 
Names,  1890-1899;  2d  ed.,  Washington,  1901. 

XV 


xvi 

e,  or  6 
i 

i 

i' 


o 

6 

u 

u 


INSTRUCTIONS 

has  the  sound  of  e in  men.  Examples:  Men, 
district ; mien,  face,  surface ; sue,  snow ; t'ie, 
iron ; ye,  wild ; hue,  cavern ; t'ien,  field ; yen,  salt. 

has  the  sound  of  i in  ravine,  or  of  ee  in  beet. 
Examples:  si,  west;  tsi,  rocks  under  water; 
h'i,  rivulet ; ni,  mud ; i (also  read  yi)  city, 
hamlet. 

is  short  as  i in  sin,  or  i in  view  when  followed  by 
n,  by  another  vowel,  or  by  a diphthong.  Ex- 
amples: kin,  gold;  ts'ing,  blue;  kia,  family; 
kiang,  river ; tien,  palace ; kHau,  bridge ; k'iai, 
model. 

signifies  that  a vowel  is  to  be  intonated  simulta- 
neously with  the  adjoining  sonant.  Examples: 
ch'i,  pool  or  lake ; sM,  stone,  rock ; ji,  sun ; 
ssi,  township ; tz'i,  porcelain ; 'ir,  two.  This 
symbol  is  also  used  in  describing  the  sound  ei 
in  words  like  le;i,  nei,  etc.,  the  i of  which  is  but 
faintly  heard  and  disappears,  as  it  were,  in  the 
preceding  e. 

has  the  sound  of  o in  mote.  Examples:  so,  a 
place;  ho,  river;  fo,  Buddha;  po,  a marshy 
lake. 

has  the  sound  of  o in  German,  Hungarian,  Swe- 
dish, Norwegian,  and  Danish,  or  of  eu  in 
French  jeu,  or  of  o in  English  love.  Exam- 
ples : mon,  gate,  door ; shong,  province ; to, 
virtue. 

has  the  sound  of  oo  in  boot.  Examples:  hu,  lake  ; 
ku,  valley ; fu,  prefecture. 

is  short  when  preceding  n,  a,  o,  or  a diphthong. 
Examples : t'un,  village ; lung,  east ; kuang, 
broad ; ch'uan,  river,  watercourses,  Szi-ch’uan 


FOR  PRONUNCIATION  xvii 

province ; chuang,  a farm ; huang,  yellow ; 
kuan,  frontier  pass,  custom-house ; twaw,  short ; 
kuo^  kingdom ; k'uai,  quick, 
u (u  with  the  umlaut)  has  the  sound  of  u in  French 
elu.  Examples:  sit,  islet;  ku,  embankment; 
Fit,  a drain ; Ait,  market-place, 
ii  is  short  when  preceding  w,  a,  or  e.  Examples: 
sitn,  military  station;  ts'iian,  fountain;  yiian, 
source ; site,  snow ; yue,  moon, 
ai  has  the  sound  of  i in  ice.  Examples:  hai,  sea; 
t'ai,  terrace,  tower ; cTiai,  stronghold,  hill 
fortress;  at,  cliff,  ledge. 

au  has  the  sound  of  ow  in  how.  Examples:  au, 
bay,  cove ; kau,  high  ; lau,  old ; miau,  temple, 
ei'  has  the  sound  of  the  Italian  e and  i combined, 
somewhat  like  ey  in  the  English  they.  Exam- 
ples: Aei,  black;  lei,  thunder;  mei,  coal;  pe:i, 
north ; wei,  tail,  end. 

du  is  a diphthong  in  which  the  two  elements  are 
distinctly  intonated,  as  in  iVw,  head,  which 
should  have  the  sound  of  the  first  word  in  the 
Hebrew  tohu  bohu  without  its  h.  Examples: 
Idu,  a house  with  an  upper  story ; k'6u,  mouth, 
embouchure,  port;  k6u,  ditch;  Mu,  after, 
behind ; f6u,  mound. 

ui  is  sounded  like  ooi,  contracted  into  a diphthong, 
or  like  ui  in  the  German  pfui.  Examples:  ihui, 
water,  river ; kui,  whirling  waters ; tui,  a heap 
(as  of  rocks). 

Consonants 

The  initials  k,  p,  t,  ch,  ts,  and  tz  should  not  be 
as  hard  as  in  English,  though  decidedly  harder 


INSTRUCTIONS 


than  g,  b,  d,  dj,  and  dz.  Thus  the  initial  in  kan, 
sweet,  should  hold  about  the  middle  between 
the  initials  in  English  gone  and  con.  To  indi- 
cate that  k,  p,  t,  ch,  ts,  and  tz  should  be  pro- 
nounced as  hard  as  possible  an  asper  is  placed 
after  them,  which  is  frequently  replaced  by  an 
apostrophe.  Examples:  kan,  sweet;  k'an,  a 
pit ; ping,  soldier ; p'ing,  even,  level ; to,  many ; 
lo-t'o,  a camel ; chau,  morning ; ch'au,  dy- 
nasty ; tsiau,  half-tide  rocks ; ts'iau,  mountain- 
ous ; tzi,  purple ; tz'i-M,  gentle,  or  motherly, 
pleasure  (principal  name  of  the  Empress 
Dowager). 

has  the  sound  of  ch  in  church,  slightly  softer 
when  not  marked  and  slightly  harder  when 
marked  by  an  asper.  Examples : ch6u,  island ; 
ch'ong,  walled  city.  When  followed  by  i,  the 
vowel  disappears  in  it. 

as  in  English  king,  poll,  and  tall,  but  slightly 
softer,  and  harder  when  marked  by  an  asper. 
Examples:  k6u,  ditch,  drain  ; k'ong,  a pit ; pan, 
police  ward;  p'u,  shore,  branch  of  a river; 

^ tan,  island ; t'an,  a rapid. 

slightly  softer  than  the  two  consonants  would 
sound  in  English,  and  harder  when  provided 
with  an  asper.  Examples:  tso,  a pool;  Wun, 
village. 

similar  to  U,  the  vowel  disappearing  in  the  sibi- 
lant. Examples:  tzi,  son;  te’i,  hall. 

as  in  English.  Examples:  fong,  summit,  peak; 
fdu,  mound. 

as  in  English,  or  as  x in  Spanish  Xeres,  both  pro- 
nunciations being  heard  in  North  China.  Ex- 
amples : hung,  red ; hiie,  cavern ; hia,  a gorge. 


FOR  PRONUNCIATION 


XIX 


j as  j in  French  jeu,  and  not  as  in  English.  Ex- 
amples: jon,  man;  jo,  hot.  When  followed 
by  i the  vowel  disappears  in  it. 

1 fas  in  English.  Examples:  ling,  mountain  pass, 
m|  range ; mi,  rice ; ni,  mud ; an,  a small  temple  ; 
n [ kuan,  inn. 

r dental,  not  guttural,  occurs  solely  in  combination 
with  the  vowel  i‘,  which  disappears  in  it,  so  that 
it  is  difficult  to  say  whether  it  is  an  initial 
or  a final.  Example:  ir,  two. 
sh  as  in  English  show.  Example:  shang,  above. 
When  followed  by  i,  the  vowel  disappears  in  it. 
Example:  sM,  ten. 

ss  is  a sharp  sibilant,  as  in  English  mess,  in  which 
the  vowel  i disappears.  Example:  ssi,  mon- 
astery. 

w as  in  English.  Example:  wan,  gulf,  bay. 
y a consonant,  as  in  English  yard.  Examples:  ye, 
wild  land ; yen,  a precipice ; ying,  a military 
camp ; yuan,  an  eddy. 

ng  as  a final,  as  ng  in  English  song.  Examples  : t'ing, 
an  inferior  prefecture ; Uing,  a well ; yang, 
ocean  ; kang,  hill,  ridge  ; chung,  middle ; t'ang, 
dyke,  pool;  tung,  a cave.  In  certain  words 
beginning  with  a,  o,  or  o,  ng  is  optional  as  an 
initial,  and  should  not  appear  in  any  transcrip- 
tion. Thus  an,  repose,  is  by  some  individuals 
pronounced  ngan,  for  which  reason  we  often 
read  Si-ngan-fu  instead  of  Si  an-fu. 

Note  1.  — The  accent  in  the  vocalic  combinations  du, 
ie  and  Ue  shows  which  of  the  two  vowels  is  to  be  intonated ; 
it  is  otherwise  not  essential ; and  it  must  not  be  mistaken 
for  a word-accent. 


XX 


INSTRUCTIONS  FOR  PRONUNCIATION 


Note  2.  — In  the  modern  Peking  dialect  linguistic 
evolution  has  brought  about  certain  changes  in  initials 
such  as  may  be  observed  in  the  pronunciation  of  Latin  — 
the  change  of  c,  originally  a decided  guttural,  into  a sibi- 
lant having  been  first  drawn  attention  to  by  Aug.  Schlei- 
cher under  the  name  of  “zetacism.”  It  can  be  compared 
to  such  words  as  the  Greek  KiKepav  and  the  Italian  cice- 
ro7ie,  Scotch  kirk  and  English  church,  German  Kinn  and 
English  chin.  In  the  Peking  dialect,  however,  not  only 
is  k before  i and  ii  changed  into  the  sibilant  ch  (kiang^ 
river,  becomes  chiang ; Fuan,  dog,  becomes  ch'iian),  but 
the  initial  ts  also  becomes  ch,  and  both  the  initials  h and  s 
are  changed  into  hs.  The  name  of  the  well-known  prov- 
ince Kiang-si  thus  becomes  Chiang-hsi ; those  of  the  great 
emperors  K’ang-hi  and  K’ien-lung  are  changed  into  K'ang- 
hsi  and  Ch'ien-lung ; and  those  of  the  city  of  Tsi-nan  be- 
comes Chi-nan.  The  adoption  of  Peking  spelling  in 
transcribing  Chinese  words  is  bound  to  create  confusion, 
chiefly  in  connection  with  such  changes  in  the  initials, 
which  are  liable  to  disturb  readers  accustomed  to  the 
traditional  style  much  more  than  any  other  deviation  in 
the  transcription  of  sounds.  Whether  Kiu-kiang,  the 
name  of  the  treaty  port,  be  spelled  in  the  old  English  style 
Kew-keang  or,  as  by  French  Sinologues,  Kieou-kiang,  will 
not  matter  much,  whereas  the  Peking  spelling  Chiu-ehiang 
renders  the  name  almost  unrecognizable  to  readers  look- 
ing for  it  on  any  of  the  existing  maps  of  China.  I have, 
therefore,  in  my  transcriptions  retained  the  traditional 
initials  (k,  ts,  h,  and  s),  while  otherwise  reducing  the 
spelling  to  a certain  conformity  with  the  phonetic  princi- 
ples likely  to  become  standards  for  geographical  names 
both  in  England  and  in  the  United  States. 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


I 


MYTHOLOGICAL  AND  LEGENDARY 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


I 

MYTHOLOGICAL  AND  LEGENDARY 
§ 1.  The  Fabulous  Cosmogony 

A GOOD  deal  of  what  Chinese  authors  have  placed  on 
record  as  the  beginnings  of  their  history  is  probably 
nothing  more  than  prehistoric  lore  invented  by 
generations  much  later  than  the  events  themselves.  The 
inventors  evince  a certain  amount  of  logic  in  assuming  that 
a degree  of  development  was  necessary  to  prepare  mankind, 
as  far  as  known  to  the  Chinese  race,  for  that  state  of  civiliza- 
tion without  which  accounts  of  the  beginnings  of  history 
will  not  appear  plausible. 

The  mythological  period  of  the  Chinese,  like  that  of  other 
ancient  nations,  stretches  from  the  creation  of  the  world 
out  of  chaos  to  what  at  first  sight  looks  like  history,  but 
which  does  not  deserve  that  name.  From  the  scientific 
point  of  view  this  period  should  be  allowed  a much  wider 
range  than  from  that  of  the  less  critical  Chinese  historians. 

It  should  be  remarked  at  once  that  the  Chinese  themselves 
do  not  refer  to  any  tradition  written  or  unvTitten  as  to 
their  most  ancient  forefathers  having  immigrated  from 
abroad.  Their  oldest  habitat  was,  so  far  as  their  own 
literature  goes,  the  cradle  of  Chinese  civilization  in  the 

3 


4 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


present  provinces  of  Shen-si  and  Kan-su  in  the  northwest 
of  China.  If  they  have  at  any  time  immigrated  there  from 
some  other  part  of  the  world,  we  possess  absolutely  no 
record  of  it.  The  gods  and  demigods  mentioned  as  the 
predecessors  of  their  legendary  emperors  are  supposed  to 
have  originated  in  territories  within  that  limited  geographi- 
cal area  peculiar  to  the  times  in  which  these  legends  were 
invented  by  the  popular  imagination  of  the  ancient  Chinese. 
We  are  thus  left  in  the  dark  as  to  any  wanderings  of  the 
race,  whether  from  central,  northern,  or  western  Asia,  to 
their  later  homes.  To  judge  from  native  accounts,  the 
Chinese  must  have  been  living  in  the  northwestern  part  of 
the  country  now  called  China  from  the  very  earliest  period 
of  their  own  history.  The  safest  view  we  can,  therefore, 
take  of  their  origin  is  that  of  the  agnostic. 

Chinese  mythology  refers  the  origin  of  the  human  race 
to  a fabulous  creatm’e  known  by  the  name  of  P’an-ku,  the 
first  human  being,  though  endowed  with  all  supernatural 
powers.  The  several  myths  connected  with  his  cosmo- 
gonic origin,  his  appearance,  nature,  and  first  dissolution, 
vary  in  the  different  accounts  manufactured  about  him 
and  his  life.  Such  myths  have,  of  course,  nothing  to  do 
with  history.  Millions  of  years  are  said  to  have  elapsed 
from  the  time  of  his  creation  down  to  the  historical 
period. 

The  fabulous  period  following  P’an-ku,  whom  the  poetic 
fancy  of  his  inventors  regarded  as  the  first  ruler  of  the 
world,  was  followed  by  ten  distinct  epochs  of  sovereigns, 
some  of  whom  are,  even  from  the  fabulous  point  of  view, 
nothing  more  than  mere  names  to  us.  All  that  is  interest- 
ing in  connection  with  their  alleged  doings  is  some  sort  of 
progress  in  civilization  ascribed  to  these  several  periods. 


MYTHOLOGICAL  AND  LEGENDARY 


5 


Next  following  P’an-ku,  the  so-called  t’ien-huang,  “ Heavenly 
emperors,”  a succession  of  thirteen  brothers,  represent  a 
state  of  life  similar  to  that  of  our  Paradise.  Man  in  those 
days  lived  a life  of  perfect  innocence,  and  knew  neither 
temptation  nor  impurity.  Some  authors  ascribe  to  this 
early  period  the  invention  of  the  so-called  Ten  Stems 
(shl-kan)  and  Twelve  Branches  (sh'i-ir-chi) , series  of  ten 
and  twelve  symbols  afterward  combined  to  form  the 
“Cycle  of  Sixty”  in  the  present  Chinese  calendar.  Each 
of  the  thirteen  brothers  is  credited  with  a reign  of  eighteen 
thousand  years. 

The  Heavenly  emperors  were  followed  by  the  ti-huang, 
“Terrestrial  emperors,”  eleven  brothers,  credited  wdth 
having  first  distinguished  sun,  moon,  and  constellations. 
They  instituted  the  divisions  day  and  night,  and  discovered 
that  thirty  days  constituted  a month.  Their  homes  were 
ascribed  to  the  hills  of  Hiung-ir  and  Lung-mon.  The 
former  name  appears  later  on  in  Ho-nan ; the  latter,  in 
various  towns  of  northern  China. 

The  next  generation  saw  the  jon-huang,  “Human  em- 
perors,” nine  brothers,  who  divided  the  world  known  to 
them  into  nine  countries,  a kingdom  for  each,  with  cities 
and  towns. 

These  fabulous  creatures  form  the  so-called  epoch  of  the 
Three  (or  Nine)  emperors.  It  is  followed  by  a period  of 
“Five  dragons”  (wu-lung),  and  this  again  by  other  series 
of  rulers,  each  comprising  so  many  generations  and  having 
fanciful  names,  down  to  the  Yin-ti  epoch,  when  the  nation 
was  ruled  by  thirteen  families  known  as  Yu-ch’au,  “The 
Nest- builders,”  from  yu,  “to  have,  to  possess,  to  occupy,” 
and  ch’au,  “a  nest.”  Numbers  of  names  are  constructed 
in  this  way,  the  syllable  yu  indicating  that  their  bearers 


6 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


held  a territory  named  in  the  second  syllable.  Yin-ti 
taught  the  people  to  build  dwellings  as  a protection  against 
the  animal  world.  Beasts  of  all  kinds  are  believed  to  have 
lived  in  perfect  peace  with  mankind.  Primeval  man  was 
supposed  to  subsist  on  a vegetarian  diet,  and  it  was  not 
before  he  began  to  kill  them  for  food  that  animals  became 
hostile  to  him. 

The  Yu-ch’au  were  followed  by  Sui-jon,  '‘the  Fire  Pro- 
ducer,” the  Prometheus  of  the  Chinese,  who  discovered  the 
fiery  element  by  looking  up  to  the  stars.  This,  however, 
did  not  lead  to  any  practical  application  until  he  observed 
a bird  pecking  at  a tree  and  thus  producing  sparks.  The 
result  was  the  discovery,  that  fire  might  be  produced  by 
rubbing  pieces  of  wood  against  each  other ; and  this  in 
due  course  led  to  the  art  of  cooking.  The  same  ruler  is 
the  reputed  inventor  of  the  prehistoric  knot-writing  of 
the  Chinese. 

Several  of  the  phenomena  of  progress  in  civilization  at- 
tributed to  these  fabulous  sovereigns  reappear  as  new  inven- 
tions during  subsequent  periods.  Tlae  most  that  may  be 
gathered  from  such  incidents  of  ancient  lore  is  the  convic- 
tion that  Chinese  literature  knows  no  beginning  for  certain 
elements  of  culture  within  the  historical  period  and,  there- 
fore, assigns  them  to  the  mythological  ages. 

These  periods  represent  a somewhat  arbitrary  mixture  of 
cultural  development,  even  if  we  look  upon  them  as  mere 
symbols  of  what  might  have  been.  It  will  be  found  that, 
like  history  itself,  the  fabulous  accounts  that  take  its  place 
repeat  themselves.  As  symbols  for  certain  periods  of 
social  development  the  legendary  emperors  that  follow  the 
Yin-ti  period  claim  a somewhat  deeper  interest.  Ssi-ma 
Ts’i^n,  the  Herodotus  of  the  Chinese,  is  in  this  respect  a 


MYTHOLOGICAL  AND  LEGENDARY 


7 


somewhat  better  guide  to  us  than  the  inventors  of  pre- 
historic legends.  He  commences  his  list  of  emperors  with 
Huang-ti/  the  first  ruler  to  whom  a chronological  period 
is  assigned. 


§ 2.  Fu-m  (2852-2738  b.c.)^ 

The  alleged  first  emperor  of  Chinese  historians,  Fu-hi, 
if  we  ignore  the  still  more  fabulous  period  preceding  him, 
cannot,  of  course,  have  been  a historical  personage.  Chro- 
nologists  do  not  agree  as  to  his  exact  lifetime,  but,  con- 
sidering the  legendary  character  of  his  existence,  this  need 
not  concern  us  much.  The  Chinese  place  him  in  the  begin- 
ning of  the  third  millennium  b.c.  He  is  also  known  by 
the  name  of  Pau-hi,  which  may  be  merely  a different  way 
of  writing  the  name  Fu-hi;  for  we  cannot  know  what 
phonetic  changes  the  syllables  now  pronounced  Fu  and 
Pau  respectively  may  have  undergone  since  the  name  was 
first  used  or  invented.  His  official  name  as  an  emperor 
was  T’ai-hau,  "the  Great  Almighty.”  Later  generations 
represent  him  as  partly  a supernatural  being  and  partly 
an  emperor  of  human  form.  This  is  one  of  the  dangers  of 
the  prehistoric  accounts  of  the  Chinese,  which  are  often 
reconstructed  in  imitation  of  facts  that  look  like  history 
but  have  not  the  slightest  claim  to  historic  truth.  Super- 

* Ed.  Chavannes,  Les  mimoires  historiques  de  Se-ma  Ts’ien.  Paris, 
1895,  vol.  i,  p.  25.  ^ Different  dates  are  given  by  the  following  writers : 
Mayers  {The  Chinese  Reader’s  Manual,  p.  366),  2852-2738  b.c.;  Giles 
(A  Chinese  Biographical  Dictionary, 'p.  233),  2953-2838  b.c.  ; Arendt 
{Synchronistische  Regententabellen,  etc.,  in  Mittheilungen  des  Seminars 
fiir  Orientalische  Sprachen,  Jahrgang  ii,  1899,  p.  216),  2852-2738  b.c. 
For  chronological  data  I propose  to  follow  the  last-named  work  as 
being  the  result  of  a careful,  special  inquiry  into  the  subject  of 
chronology. 


8 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


natural  accounts  will  be  taken  for  what  they  are  worth, 
and  the  historians  repeating  them  deserve  greater  credit 
than  the  uncritical  crowd,  who  are  bent  on  representing 
the  impossible  as  matter  of  fact. 

According  to  some  accounts,  Fu-hi  was  the  successor  of 
Sui-jon,  the  Fire  Producer,  who  selected  him  among  four 
of  his  disciples.  His  mother,  Hua-su,  according  to  some 
writers  a native  of  Lan-t’ien  near  the  present  city  of  Si-an-fu, 
gave  birth  to  him  under  miraculous  circumstances  at  a 
place  called  Ch’ong-ki,  somewhere  in  the  neighborhood  of 
Kung-ch’ang,  in  the  present  province  of  Kan-su.  I lay 
stress  on  this  otherwise  unimportant  statement  made  by 
later  writers,  because  it  shows  again  that  the  Chinese 
themselves  do  not  look  upon  their  earliest  rulers  as  immi- 
grants. Neither  Fu-hi  nor  any  of  his  still  more  fabulous 
predecessors  are  mentioned  as  having  anything  to  do  with 
territories  outside  the  northwest  of  modern  China.  In 
other  words,  if  the  Chinese  race  has  at  all  immigrated  from 
any  other  part  of  the  world,  no  tradition  of  such  wander- 
ings has  sm’vived  among  the  early  legendary  accounts  of 
the  people. 

What  we  hear  of  Fu-hi’s  life  from  his  biographer  * is  a 
mixture  of  supernatural  features  and  mock  reality.  His 
appearance  is  described  as  somewhat  like  that  of  a Triton, 
a human  figure  the  lower  part  of  which  has  the  shape  of 
a scaly  serpent.  The  well-known  stone  sculptures  of  the 
Wu-chi-shan  tombs  in  Shan-tung,  dating  from  the  second 
century  a.d.,  described  by  Professor  Ed.  Chavannes,^  con- 
tain a representation  of  Fu-hi  and  of  an  apparently  female 
figure,  perhaps  his  wife  or  sister,  the  lower  part  of  the  two 

* Chavannes,  op.  dt.,  p.  3.  ^ Idem,  La  sculpture  sur  pierre  en  Chine 
au  temps  des  deux  dynasties  Han.  Paris,  1893. 


MYTHOLOGICAL  AND  LEGENDARY 


9 


bodies  being  represented  by  serpents’  tails  intertwined 
with  each  other. 

According  to  those  authorities  who  consider  him  as  the 
first  real  ruler,  it  was  Fu-hi  who  established  order  in  the 
social  relations  of  his  people,  who,  before  him,  had  lived 
like  animals  in  the  wilds.  He  is  also  supposed  to  have 
introduced  the  marriage  bond,  which  was  previously  un- 
knovm.  It  was  he  who  taught  the  people  to  hunt,  to  fish, 
and  to  keep  flocks.  He  constructed  musical  instruments 
of  wood  and  silk  threads.  He  is  also  looked  upon  as  the 
inventor  of  those  mysterious  eight  diagrams,  the  pa-kua, 
a series  of  lines  of  symbolic  meaning,  embodying  the  oldest 
system  of  Chinese  mystic  philosophy,  which,  in  spite  of 
many  ingenious  efforts  on  the  part  of  European  students, 
still  remain  a mystery  to  our  philosophers.  He  is  further 
supposed  to  have  replaced  the  ancient  knot-writing,  which 
may  have  resembled  the  quipu  of  the  Peruvians,  by  a 
system  of  hieroglyphics.  He  arranged  some  kind  of  a 
calendar,  and  gave  expression  to  his  religious  sentiment 
by  being  the  first  to  introduce  sacrifice  to  his  God  on  the 
sacred  mount  of  T’ai-shan.  His  capital  was  a city  called 
Ch’on,  in  the  present  province  of  Ho-nan.  He  is  supposed 
to  have  died  after  a reign  of  115  years,  and  to  have  been 
succeeded  by  a personage  called  Nii-kua,  or  Nii-wa,  whether 
a man  or  a woman  is  doubtful.  According  to  some, 
Nii-kua  was  Fu-hi’s  sister.  She,  too,  is  occasionally  repre- 
sented as  having  a human  head  with  the  body  of  a serpent. 

Nii-kua  did  not  add  much  to  Fu-hi’s  work  in  the  way  of 
new  phases  of  civilization,  but  he,  or  she,  is  supposed  to 
have  invented  the  shong,  a kind  of  reed  organ;  and  when 
Fu-hi’s  evil  spirit,  his  minister  Kung-kung,  had  smashed 
the  vault  of  heaven,  it  was  Nii-kua  who  patched  up  the 


10 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


broken  firmament  by  melting  stones.  A further  legend, 
current  in  Cambodia  in  the  twelfth  century  a.d.,  speaks  of 
certain  stains  visible  in  a distant  corner  of  the  sky  which 
she  did  not  succeed  in  repairing;  referring  apparently  to 
the  so-called  "coal-sacks”  near  the  Southern  Cross. 

§ 3.  Shon-nung  (2737-2705  b.c.) 

If,  in  following  some  Chinese  authors,  we  assume  Nii-kua 
to  have  reigned  merely  in  the  name  of  Fu-hi,  the  second 
legendary  emperor  was  Shon-nung.  His  dynastic  appella- 
tion was  Yen-ti.  We  find  him  sometimes  represented  as 
having  the  body  of  a man  and  the  head  of  an  ox.  To  him 
is  ascribed  the  invention  of  the  principal  agricultural  im- 
plements and  the  introduction  of  field  labor,  as  is  indicated 
by  his  name,  Shon-nung,  which  may  be  rendered  “Divine 
laborer.”  Among  the  several  phases  of  civilization,  the 
introduction  of  which  is  ascribed  to  him,  the  most  note- 
worthy is  the  discovery  of  the  medicinal  properties  of 
plants.  I have  already  remarked  that  the  value  of  the 
several  discoveries  ascribed  to  the  legendary  emperors  is 
of  a negative  character,  inasmuch  as  it  may  be  assumed 
that  the  beginnings  of  certain  cultural  elements  were 
placed  by  the  Chinese  in  the  legendary  era  because  they 
could  not  be  traced  to  any  time  within  the  historical 
period.  This  holds  good  particularly  in  connection  with 
the  Emperor  Shon-nung’s  alleged  discoveries.  What  that 
ruler  is  supposed  to  have  done  in  connection  with  the 
products  of  the  vegetable  kingdom  and  their  medicinal 
properties  has  been  collected  in  a book  entitled  Shon-nung- 
pdn-ts’au-king  (“Tlie  Classic  of  Shon-nung’s  Botany”). 
The  book  itself  is  no  longer  extant;  but  it  is  constantly 


MYTHOLOGICAL  AND  LEGENDARY 


11 


quoted  as  an  authority  in  later  works  on  the  subject. 
There  can  be  no  doubt  that  this  work  of  Shon-nung’s  is  as 
much  a fabrication  of  later  periods  as  the  emperor  himself. 
What  it  teaches  us,  however,  is  that  the  knowledge  con- 
veyed in  it  could  not  be  historically  assigned  to  any  other 
period  and  was  handed  down  from  a time  lying  beyond  the 
beginning  of  Chinese  history.  Possibly  it  is  identical  with 
some  similar  production  supposed  to  have  existed  during 
the  Han  dynasty.  The  Emperor  Shon-nung’s  name  may 
have  been  added  to  the  title,  in  order  to  show  that  the 
knowledge  conveyed  in  the  work  is  of  the  most  ancient 
origin.  Chang  Yii-si,  an  author  of  the  eleventh  century, 
says  with  regard  to  it : — 

“ In  remote  times,  when  the  art  of  writing  was  not  yet  known, 
science  was  transmitted  from  generation  to  generation  by  oral 
tradition,  and  what  was  called  Pon-ts’au  then  was  not  a written 
book.  From  the  period  of  the  Han  dynasties  medical  art  began  to 
develop.  Chang  Ki  and  Hua  T’o  [celebrated  physicians  in  the 
third  century  of  our  era]  contributed  largely  to  the  completion  and 
diffusion  of  medical  knowledge,  commented  on  previous  writings 
and  added  new  information,  arranging  the  whole  into  a system; 
and  this  was  probably  the  time  when  the  materia  medica  of  Shon- 
nung  first  appeared  as  a written  treatise.”  * 

The  localities  mentioned  in  connection  with  the  life  of 
Shon-nung  are  for  the  most  part  in  the  northwest  of  China, 
he  having  resided  in  the  old  capital  of  his  predecessors. 
But  he  is  supposed  to  have  come  originally  from  a place  in 
Hu-pei,  to  have  lived  later  on  at  K’ii-f6u,  the  birthplace  of 
Confucius,  in  Shan-tung,  and  to  have  been  buried  in 
Ch’ang-sha,  the  present  capital  of  Hu-nan.  It  would 
seem  that  the  manufacturers  of  the  accounts  of  the  legend- 

^ Bretschneider,  Botanicon  Sinicum,  in  Journal  of  the  China  Branch 
of  the  Royal  Asiatic  Society,  1881,  p.  28. 


12 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


ary  era  wished  to  indicate  thereby  the  gradual  increase  of 
the  Chinese  sphere  of  civilization  in  the  prehistoric  period. 

To  Shon-nung  is  ascribed  the  foundation  of  a family 
which  furnished  emperors  in  several  generations.  Since 
these  are  mere  names,  and  the  authorities  disagree  as  to 
their  chronology,  we  need  not  trouble  about  them  till  we 
come  to  Huang-ti,  ‘‘Yellow  Emperor.” 


§ 4.  Huang-ti  (2704-2595  b.c.) 

The  accounts  regarding  the  life  of  this  monarch,  the 
third  of  the  series  of  great  emperors  grouped  by  the  Chinese 
under  the  name  of  wu-ti,  “Tlie  Five  Rulers,”  are  also  very 
contradictory.  According  to  Ssi-ma  Ts’ien  he  was  the 
son  of  Shau-ti6n,  which  would  imply  his  relationship  to 
Shon-nung;  Shau-tien  being  mentioned  as  the  father  of 
the  latter  emperor  also,  in  spite  of  discrepancies  in  the 
chronology,  which  is,  of  course,  as  fictitious  as  the  entire 
structure  of  legends  before  us.  Huang-ti’s  supernatural 
qualities  became  apparent  from  his  very  birth,  since  as  an 
infant  he  had  a full  command  of  language.  From  Ssi-ma 
Ts’ien’s  account  it  would  appear  that  Huang-ti,  whose 
personal  name  was  Hien-yuan,  was  a contemporary  of 
Sh5n-nmig;  that  anarchy  had  set  in  under  the  eyes  of 
the  old  emperor,  his  own  descendants  fighting  each  other; 
and  that  Hien-yiian  became  emperor  by  virtue  of  his  su- 
perior energy.  As  such  he  persecuted  the  refractory,  while 
leaving  alone  the  peaceful.  He  cut  passages  through  the 
hills  and  built  roads,  so  that  in  times  of  peace  he  did  not 
enjoy  a moment’s  rest.  He  extended  his  empire  in  the 
east  to  the  sea  of  Shan-tung,  in  the  west  far  beyond  Kan-su, 
and  in  the  south  to  the  Yang-tzi-kiang;  while  in  the  north 


MYTHOLOGICAL  AND  LEGENDARY 


13 


he  drove  away  the  Hun-yii.  This  name  is  probably  merely 
another  transcription  of  what  the  Chinese  afterward  called 
Hiung-nu,  their  old  hereditary  enemy  on  the  northern 
boundary,  and  the  ancestors  of  King  Attila’s  Huns.  If  we 
cannot  look  upon  these  tribes  in  this  remote  legendary 
period  as  having  a historical  existence,  the  mention  of  them 
certainly  seems  to  show  that  a nation  called  Hun-yii,  and 
occupying  the  northern  confines  of  China,  may  have  been 
among  the  earliest  historical  traditions  of  the  Chinese. 
Having  consolidated  his  empire,  Huang-ti  moved  to  and 
fro  within  its  limits  with  his  military  encampments,  with- 
out having  a fixed  place  of  residence.  Chavannes ' suggests 
that  this  passage  in  Ssi-ma  Ts’ien’s  account  may  point  to 
nomad  life  among  the  ancient  Chinese.  Huang-ti  regu- 
lated the  sacrificial  and  the  religious  ceremonies  of  his 
people,  and  he  further  improved  upon  Shon-nung’s  agri- 
cultural work  by  determining  the  time  when  cereals  were 
to  be  sown  and  trees  planted,  and  by  devoting  his  attention 
to  the  animal  kingdom.  Astronomy,  too,  received  his 
attention,  as  did  the  waves  of  the  sea,  the  rocks,  metals, 
and  jade.  Quite  a number  of  the  fundamental  inventions 
of  Chinese  civilization  are  ascribed  to  him. 

It  is  hardly  necessary  to  enumerate  here  all  the  facts 
ascribed  to  this  legendary  period,  which,  as  I have  said, 
cannot  be  historical.  For  us  the  legendary  emperors  from 
Fu-hi  onward  are  nothing  more  than  symbols  of  the  earli- 
est developments  of  Chinese  civilization,  as  the  inventors 
imagined  it,  possibly  in  connection  with  old  traditions. 
From  the  time  of  Fu-hi,  however,  a certain  logic  in  the 
order  in  which  the  principal  phases  of  Chinese  civilization 
follow  each  other  becomes  apparent;  and  we  shall  not 

' Les  memoires  historiques,  vol.  i,  p.  31,  note  3. 


14 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


venture  too  much  if,  on  the  one  hand,  we  discard  all  chro- 
nology in  connection  with  these  emperors,  and,  on  the 
other,  regard  their  names  merely  as  representatives  of  the 
preparatory  periods  of  culture  in  Chinese  national  life. 

If  the  old  accounts  say  of  Fu-hi  that  the  people  before 
him  lived  like  animals,  wrapped  their  bodies  in  skins,  ate 
raw  meat,  knew  only  their  mothers  and  not  their  fathers, 
and  did  not  practise  matrimony ; that  it  was  he  who  raised 
his  nation  from  this  state  of  savage  life  by  introducing 
hunting,  fishing,  cattle-breeding,  the  calendar,  matrimony, 
and  cooking,  — all  this  means  no  more  than  that  he  was  the 
representative  of  what  is  found  in  the  beginnings  of  all 
histories;  namely,  the  period  of  hunting  and  nomadic  life. 
As  regards  the  chronology  assigned  to  the  legendary  period, 
if  the  time  allotted  to  some  of  these  rulers  is  much  too  long 
as  a term  of  government  for  a single  human  life,  it  is,  on 
the  other  hand,  much  too  short,  if  we  measure  it  by  the 
cultural  progress  it  involves  for  the  nation.  Fu-hi’s  period 
of  hunting  life  must  have  lasted  many  generations  before 
it  led  to  the  agricultural  period  represented  by  the  name 
Shon-nung ; and  this  period  in  turn  could  not  possibly  have 
led  within  a little  more  than  one  hundred  years  to  the 
enormous  progress  ascribed  to  Huang-ti. 


§ 5.  Supposed  Introduction  op  a Foreign  Civiliza- 
tion UNDER  Huang-ti 

An  ingenious,  but,  I am  afraid,  hopeless  attempt  was 
made  by  the  late  Professor  Terrien  de  Lacouperie  to  explain 
the  several  cultural  developments  ascribed  to  the  Emperor 
Huang-ti  as  offshoots  of  Babylonian  civilization.  I have 
already  declared  my  own  views  to  be  those  of  an  agnostic. 


MYTHOLOGICAL  AND  LEGENDARY 


15 


Chinese  tradition  contains  no  clue  to  a migration  of  the 
Chinese  race,  or  any  part  of  it,  from  west  to  east;  and  the 
arguments  laid  down  by  De  Lacouperie  in  his  bulky 
volume  devoted  to  this  problem  ‘ seem  to  be  doomed  to 
share  the  fate  of  De  Guignes’  attempt  (before  the  French 
Academy  in  1758)  to  prove  that  the  Chinese  had  grown 
out  of  an  Egyptian  colony. 

Every  student  of  the  Chinese  language  is  aware  that 
the  Chinese  are  very  fond  of  expressing  categories  in 
certain  round  numbers,  which  have  no  deeper  meaning 
than,  say,  the  Latin  sexcenti,  in  the  sense  of  an  indefinitely 
large  number.  Thus  the  word  pai  or  po,  which  is  pro- 
nounced pak  (bak)  in  the  Canton  dialect,  is  placed  before 
quite  a number  of  nouns,  in  order  to  denote  “totality.” 
Pai-kuan,  “the  hundred  Mandarins,”  means  “all  the 
Mandarins,”  or  “the  official  world”;  pai-ts’au,  “the  hun- 
dred plants,”  means  “all  plants,”  or  “the  vegetable  king- 
dom.” Similarly  pai-sing,  or  posing,  “the  hundred  sur- 
names,” means  “all  the  surnames,”  or  “the  people.” 
De  Lacouperie  ignores  these  analogies,  of  which,  to  judge 
from  his  general  knowledge  of  the  language,  he  must  cer- 
tainly have  been  aware,  by  explaining  the  term  posing  as 
not  a numerical  category,  but  an  ethnical  name.  He  gives 
this  number  pai  (i.e.  “a  hundred”)  its  Cantonese,  or  old, 
pronunciation  pak  or  bak,  and  translates  the  term  by  the 
“ Bak  tribes.”  Bak  Sing,  he  says,  “is  the  earliest  denomi- 
nation in  their  historical  literature  which  the  Chinese  used 
to  give  to  themselves,  exclusively  of  the  native  populations 
they  had  subdued.  The  Bak  Sings  were  the  followers  of 
Huang-ti,  who  came  with  him  from  the  northwest  and 
settled  at  first  in  the  southwest  corner  of  Kansuh.”  For 

‘ Western  Origin  of  the  Early  Chinese  Civilization,  London,  1894. 


16 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


more  than  ten  years  the  author  had  objected  to  the  common 
rendering  of  Bak  Sing  by  “ the  hundred  families,”  because 
in  his  opinion  it  was  an  early  ethnical  name.  Among  the 
arguments  brought  forward  in  support  of  this  view  the 
following  might  decoy  the  uncritical  reader:  “In  the  ex- 
pression Bak  Sing  the  first  symbol  cannot  have  had  in 
China  the  meaning  of  'one  hundred’  as  a definite  number, 
for  the  conclusive  reason  that  the  number  of  Sings  in  early 
times  was  not  one-fifth  of  that  total.  If  the  Sings  ever 
numbered  one  hundred  before  that  time,  it  must  have 
been  at  the  original  seat  of  the  race  in  western  Asia,  in  the 
country  whence  Huang-ti  and  his  followers  originated.” 
To  this  it  must  be  remarked  that  pai  or  pak  in  these  phrases 
is  not  a definite  number,  and  that  the  term  does  not  neces- 
sarily involve  that  the  people  should  have  consisted  of 
exactly  a hundred  families.  Moreover,  the  term  can- 
not be  shown  to  have  been  in  existence  at  the  time  of 
Huang-ti ; its  first  occurrence  being  traceable  to  the 
Confucian  Classics,  written  at  a time  more  than  a thousand 
years  distant  from  the  reign  of  that  emperor.  Since  the 
ethnical  meaning  “Bak  tribes”  must,  therefore,  be  looked 
upon  as  the  result  of  an  arbitrary  interpretation,  which  we 
find  nowhere  in  Chinese  literature,  I cannot  help  ex- 
pressing it  as  my  view  that  this  term  has  never  had  any 
other  meaning  than  that  of  the  totality  of  the  several  sur- 
names representing  the  Chinese  people. 

Now  Professor  De  Lacouperie  thinks  that  a people  called 
Bak  was  originally  seated  in  Babylonia,  whence  they 
migrated  eastward.  Among  the  arguments  adduced  in 
support  of  this  untenable  theory  is  the  occurrence  of 
geographical  names  in  western  Asia,  in  which  the  sound 
“Bak”  is  prominent;  e.g.  Bakhdi  (Bactra),  Bakhtan, 


MYTHOLOGICAL  AND  LEGENDARY 


17 


Bakthyari,  Bagdad  ( !),  Bagistan,  “ land  of  Bak.”  Huang-ti, 
therefore,  is,  according  to  De  Lacouperie,  not  an  aboriginal 
Chinese  ruler,  but  the  leader  of  the  '‘Bak  tribes,”  who 
brought  his  people  from  Babylonia  to  the  northwest  of 
China. 

Ssi-ma  Ts’ien  says  in  his  Shl-ki  ^ : “ From  Huang-ti  down 
to  Shun  and  Yii  all  the  emperors  had  the  same  family  name ; 
and  consequently,  to  distinguish  them,  they  were  given 
the  names  of  the  fief  of  which  they  were  lords  before  their 
accession  to  the  throne.”  Tlie  name  by  which  Huang-ti  is 
thus  sometimes  described  in  Chinese  history  is  Yu-hiung, 
which,  literally  translated,  means,  “Having  Hiung,”  or 
“Holder  of  the  fief  Hiung.”  Several  names  are  formed  in 
analogy  with  this  example;  and  I shall,  in  due  course, 
mention  some  of  the  titles  meaning  “Holder  of  such  and 
such  a fief”  and  made  up  of  the  character  yu,  “to  have,  to 
hold,”  and  the  name  of  the  fief.  Tire  character  hiung  in 
Huang-ti’s  fief  name  has  a twofold  pronunciation  in  ancient 
Chinese,  namely,  hiung  and  nai,  according  to  the  meaning 
attaching  to  it;  but  all  the  native  authorities  on  ancient 
sounds  agree  in  giving  it  the  sound  of  hiung  and  not  nai, 
when  applied  to  the  name  of  that  fief  of  which  the  Emperor 
Huang-ti  was  the  holder.  Through  an  oversight,  the  name 
has  been  transcribed  by  Yu-nai  instead  of  Yu-hiung  in  the 
chronological  table  of  IVIayers’  well-known  work,  “The 
Chinese  Reader’s  Manual”;  it  has  been  correctly  rendered 
in  Arendt’s  “ Synchronistische  Regententabellen,”  the  best 
work  we  possess  on  Chinese  chronology ; also  in  Chavannes’ 
translation  of  the  SM-ki,  in  Giles’  Dictionary;  in  fact, 
by  all  the  Sinologues  familiar  with  the  subject. 

De  Lacouperie  quite  arbitrarily  disconnects  the  name  of 
' Chavannes,  vol.  i,  p.  93;  cf.  note  3. 


18 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


the  emperor’s  fief,  Hiung,  from  the  emperor’s  sobriquet 
Yu-hiung,  gives  it  the  wrong  sound  nai,  which  he  con- 
jectures stands  for  an  original  nak,  and  joins  it  to  the  name 
Huang-ti,  in  order  to  reconstruct  a name  found  nowhere  in 
Chinese  books,  Nak-huang-ti.  This  he  declares  to  be 
identical  with  that  of  a powerful  king  of  the  Babylonians, 
Kudur  Nakhunte  (“Servant  of  Nakhunte”),  the  Elamite 
chief  god,  who  lived  about  the  time  assigned  by  Chinese 
fictitious  chronology  to  the  Emperor  Huang-ti.  This 
alleged  identity  of  the  two  names  must  certainly  be  re- 
jected on  philological  grounds;  and  as  to  facts,  it  appears 
to  me  that  history,  whether  real  or  legendary,  furnishes  no 
basis  for  the  assumption  of  an  immigration  of  Babylonians 
to  the  northwest  of  China.  I do  not  wish  to  dismiss  the 
idea  of  western  origin,  in  an  offhand  manner;  but  I must 
confess  that  the  logic  brought  to  bear  on  the  subject  in 
De  Lacouperie’s  much  too  ingenious  attempts  will  never 
inspire  one  with  confidence  in  the  results  of  his  investiga- 
tions. I avail  myself  of  this  opportunity  to  say  that  the 
work  referred  to  contains,  nevertheless,  a host  of  valuable 
suggestions,  based  on  Chinese  literature,  which  are  interest- 
ing in  connection  with  side  questions,  and  fully  deserving 
the  attention  of  students  willing  to  place  a lively  imagina- 
tion, the  basis  of  all  philological  research,  under  the  iron 
rule  of  self-criticism. 

Another  attempt  to  derive  Chinese  civilization  from  the 
West,  more  plausible  than  De  Lacouperie’s,  has  been  made 
by  Baron  von  Richthofen,^  who  looks  upon  the  oasis  of 
Khotan  in  the  southwest  of  eastern  Turkestan  as  the  cradle 
of  the  Chinese  race.  The  possibility  of  an  immigration 
from  those  parts  may  be  admitted  on  geographical  grounds 
* China,  vol.  i,  p.  48,  note. 


MYTHOLOGICAL  AND  LEGENDARY 


19 


in  connection  with  a few  legendary  accounts  placed  on 
record  by  the  Chinese;  but  we  have  to  be  cautious  as  to 
the  historical  statements  of  later  periods.  Chinese  his- 
torians of  the  fifth  and  sixth  centuries  a.d.,  it  is  true,  say 
that  the  people  of  Kau-ch’ang  {i.e.  Turfan)  and  farther 
west  have  deep  eyes  and  high  noses,  and  that  only  the 
inhabitants  of  Khotan  do  not  resemble  those  foreigners, 
they  being  similar  in  appearance  and  character  to  the 
Chinese.  The  latest  discoveries  made  in  this  part  of  Central 
Asia,  however,'  seem  to  show  that  the  civilization  of  the 
natives  of  Khotan  and  neighborhood,  including  the  once 
flourishing  oases  of  the  sand-buried  cities  in  the  desert  of 
Takla-makan,  was  imported  by  Indian  immigrants  ban- 
ished from  Taxila  in  the  Punjab  under  King  Ashoka  during 
the  third  century  b.c.^  Numerous  relics  of  Buddhist  art 
and  manuscripts  in  the  '' Kharoshthi  ” and  other  Indian 
scripts  are  testimonies  to  the  fact  that  a non-Chinese  civili- 
zation flourished  there  at  the  time,  when  the  Chinese  thought 
they  had  discovered  among  the  hated  Turks  a nation  more 
sympathetic  to  them  in  point  of  outward  appearance  and 
civilization. 

How  much  Chinese  historians  were  inclined  to  look  upon 
the  evidences  of  a superior  civilization  distinguishing  cer- 
tain foreign  nations  from  their  crude  Turkish  neighbors  in 
Central  Asia  as  a sign  of  congeniality  may  be  inferred  from 
a statement  occurring  in  the  H6u-han-shu,  the  author  of 
which  says  of  his  contemporaries,  the  inhabitants  of 
Ta-ts’in,  or  the  Roman  Orient,  that  they  are  tall  and 
upright  somewhat  like  the  Chinese,  whence  they  are  called 

' I refer  to  the  archaeological  results  of  the  famous  journeys  of 
Drs.  von  Hedin  and  Stein.  M.  A.  Stein,  Preliminary  Report  on 
a Journey  in  Chinese  Turkestan,  p.  51.  London,  1901. 


20 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


Ta-ts’in}  Chinese  vanity  was  flattered  by  the  idea,  which 
is  found  requoted  for  centuries  by  later  historians.  The 
fact  of  Chinese  authors  comparing  the  highly  civilized 
Khotanese  of  Indian  extraction  to  their  own  race  seems  to 
be  sufficiently  explained  by  this  precedent;  and  I do  not 
regard  it  as  an  argument  supporting  prehistoric  immigra- 
tion from  that  region  of  the  Tarim  basin. 


§ 6.  Fuether  Deeds  of  Huang-ti 

Huang-ti  had  to  fight  his  way  to  the  throne;  but  when 
he  had  captured  and  decapitated  Ch’i-yu,  his  chief  opponent 
and  the  first  traitor  to  plant  the  banner  of  rebellion  on 
Chinese  soil,  he  devoted  himself  to  works  of  peace.  His 
first  care  was  the  organization  of  government.  It  is  per- 
haps characteristic  of  the  great  veneration  in  which  in  all 
ages  the  writers  of  history  have  been  held  among  the 
Chinese,  that  the  inventors  of  this  period  ascribed  to 
Huang-ti  the  institution  of  a board  of  historians,  divided 
into  a right  and  a left  wing,  the  one  being  charged  with  the 
record  of  facts,  the  other  with  that  of  words  and  speeches. 
Tlie  first  state  historian  placed  at  the  head  of  the  new  board 
was  Ts’ang-kie,  the  legendary  inventor  of  the  art  of  wri- 
ting. The  more  fabulous  accounts  represent  him  as  having 
four  eyes.  He  is  supposed  to  have  derived  the  first  clue 
for  his  hieroglyphics  from  the  marks  of  birds’  claws  made  in 
sand,  which  shows  that  the  inventors  of  this  legend  cannot 
have  believed  in  Fu-hi  as  the  originator  of  the  hieroglyphic 
system. 

According  to  some,  Ts’ang-kie  merely  perfected  what  had 
been  in  existence  before  him.  His  writing  material  con- 
‘ Hirth,  China  and  the  Roman  Orient,  p.  41. 


MYTHOLOGICAL  AND  LEGENDARY 


21 


sisted  of  boards  made  of  bamboo,  on  which  he  painted  his 
hieroglyphics  with  a bamboo  brush  dipped  in  a sort  of 
varnish.  He  is  the  supposed  inventor  of  about  540  hiero- 
glyphics representing  a special  style  of  ancient  writing 
known  as  niau-tsi-won,  “script  of  birds’  footprints.” 
^^^lile  Ts’ang-kie  was  engaged  in  perfecting  the  system  of 
writing,  Huang-ti  laid  the  foundation  of  what  has  ever 
played  a most  conspicuous  part  in  Chinese  public  life,  the 
sacrificial  cult.  Hitherto  sacrifices  had  been  brought  to 
Shang-ti,  “the  Supreme  Ruler,”  in  the  open  air;  Huang-ti 
is  supposed  to  have  made  bricks  and  to  have  taught  his 
workmen  how  to  construct  houses.  With  their  assistance 
he  built  the  first  temple  for  the  offering  of  sacrifices.  He 
drew  up  rules  of  conduct  for  the  people.  He  further  built 
a palace  for  his  own  use,  in  order  to  distinguish  himself 
from  his  subjects;  for  hitherto  the  emperors  had  enjoyed 
no  privilege  in  this  respect,  they  having  all  lived  like  the 
most  lowly  of  their  subjects  in  huts  built  of  branches  of 
trees.  The  inhabitants  of  his  empire,  who  had  hitherto 
lived  scattered  about  wherever  they  chose,  were  now  settled 
in  villages,  towns,  and  provinces.  The  provinces  were 
called  ch6u,  a term  which  down  to  the  Middle  Ages  denotes 
a much  wider  district  than  it  does  at  present,  for  which 
reason  certain  titles  of  officers,  which  nowadays  do  not 
involve  high  rank,  have  to  be  differently  translated  when 
occurring  in  old  books.  The  man  placed  over  a chou,  who 
is  now  a mere  magistrate,  • was  a governor  or  viceroy  in 
ancient  times. 

To  regulate  the  calendar,  the  beginnings  of  which  are 
said  to  date  from  Fu-hi,  Huang-ti  built  an  observatory  and 
placed  it  under  the  charge  of  certain  officers,  each  of  whom 
was  given  a special  department  of  astronomical  observation. 


22 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


Some  had  to  study  the  course  of  the  sun,  others  that  of  the 
moon,  and  others  again  the  movement  of  the  five  planets. 
It  was  then  discovered  that  the  twelve  lunar  months  did 
not  suffice  to  make  up  the  year,  and  that  an  intercalary 
month  had  to  be  added.  The  observations  made  in  this 
respect  are  described  in  full  detail  by  the  historians  of  this 
legendary  period. 

The  emperor’s  wife,  Lei-tsu,  called  "the  Lady  of  Si-ling,” 
studied  the  rearing  of  silkworms,  the  principal  manipula- 
tions of  which  are  said  to  have  been  her  inventions. 

Not  satisfied  with  having  created  the  sources  of  national 
wealth,  the  emperor  provided  the  means  for  the  exchange 
of  produce  by  inventing  cars  drawn  by  oxen.  The  rivers 
and  lakes  of  his  empire  also  were  soon  covered  with  barges. 
His  soldiers  were  provided  with  bows  and  arrows,  swords 
and  lances;  and  his  regiments  were  taught  to  follow  a 
standard.  Precious  stones  and  pieces  of  gold  and  copper 
were  introduced  to  serve  as  mediums  of  exchange. 

To  cause  his  people  to  adopt  promptly  all  these  new 
elements  of  civilization,  he  ruled  with  a rod  of  iron.  Implicit 
obedience  was  the  order  of  the  day,  and  opposition  was 
threatened  with  capital  punishment.  On  the  other  hand, 
this  extreme  severity  against  rebellious  elements  was  made 
up  for  by  the  greatest  kindness  toward  the  loyal  ones 
among  his  subjects,  for  whose  benefit  he  introduced  a 
number  of  enlivening  novelties,  chiefly  in  the  way  of 
musical  instruments.  The  invention  of  certain  flutes,  com- 
bined in  a series  to  form  a kind  of  reed  organ,  is  supposed 
to  have  led  to  systematic  studies  in  connection  with  the 
production  of  certain  musical  sounds.  The  construction 
of  such  musical  instruments  called  for  a certain  accuracy 
in  measurements,  the  most  minute  details  of  which  have 


MYTHOLOGICAL  AND  LEGENDARY 


23 


been  placed  on  record  by  Chinese  authors  as  the  result  of 
observations  made  by  the  officers  appointed  for  the  purpose. 

It  is  from  these  musical  efforts  that  the  Chinese  derive 
their  entire  system  of  weights  and  measures.  Indeed,  a 
regular  system  must  have  been  indispensable  to  the  in- 
ventor of  the  Chinese  musical  notation,  which,  distasteful 
though  it  may  seem  to  the  European  ear,  is  built  up  on 
mathematical  principles  claiming  much  deeper  efforts  of 
human  thought  than  any  of  us  would  admit  to  be  the  case 
when  listening  to  the  strains  of  a Chinese  band. 

The  empress  had  in  the  meantime  brought  the  silk 
industry  to  a high  state  of  perfection.  Hitherto  the  people 
had  dressed  in  skins;  weaving  had  been  an  unknown  art; 
and  it  was  only  through  the  efforts  of  the  Lady  of  Si-ling 
that  silk  textures  were  woven,  the  empress  herself  em- 
broidering them  with  representations  of  flowers  and  birds. 
In  due  course  other  materials  were  discovered,  and  the 
emperor  was  able  to  invent  uniforms  to  be  donned  by  his 
officers  and  people  on  certain  occasions.  Rank  and  posi- 
tion were  thus  for  the  first  time  indicated  by  the  man’s 
outward  appearance.  Caps  and  tiaras,  coats,  aprons,  and 
other  garments  were  given  distinctive  shapes;  and  the 
desire  to  increase  the  variety  of  patterns  led  to  the  applica- 
tion of  color,  so  that  the  use  of  some  rude  dyeing  materials 
may  be  reasonably  assumed. 

On  one  of  his  journeys  of  inspection  the  monarch  is  sup- 
posed to  have  discovered  in  the  neighborhood  of  K’ai- 
fong-fu  a copper  mine,  which  led  to  the  establishment  of 
a foundry  in  the  province  of  Ho-nan,  where  the  first  sacri- 
ficial vases  are  supposed  to  have  been  cast  from  the  emperor’s 
models.  Huang-ti,  however,  did  not  live  to  see  the  results 
of  his  last  enterprise,  a fatal  disease  carrying  him  off  after 


24 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


a glorious  reign  of  about  one  hundred  years.  He  was  suc- 
ceeded by  his  eldest  son  Shau-hau. 

§ 7.  Shau-hau  (2594-2511  b.c.) 

Shau-hau  did  not  attain  to  the  standard  of  his  great 
father;  but  he  was  peaceably  inclined,  and  did  not  lead  his 
people  into  trouble  — a merit  that  many  a greater  man 
cannot  claim.  He  had  merely  to  continue  the  works  of 
his  father,  who  had  done  quite  enough  to  occupy  the  people 
for  some  time.  Still  Shau-hau’s  love  of  peace  must  have 
bordered  on  negligence,  since  we  read  that  during  his  reign 
the  veneration  of  Shang-ti,  the  Supreme  Ruler,  was  vio- 
lated by  some  of  his  officers,  who  gave  themselves  up  to 
heretical  doctrines. 

Shau-hau  is  credited  with  having  made  further  distinc- 
tions in  the  uniforms  of  his  mandarins;  indeed,  the  custom 
of  embroidering  representations  of  birds  on  the  uniforms 
of  civil  officials  and  of  certain  beasts  of  prey  on  those  of 
the  military  — prevailing  up  to  this  day  — is  supposed  to 
date  from  his  period.  This  is  probably  all  that  can  be 
said  of  his  rule  in  the  way  of  new  elements  of  civilization. 
Ssi-ma  Ts’ien  skips  his  name  altogether.  Shau-hau  died 
at  K’u-fou,  the  birthplace  of  Confucius,  in  Shan-tung, 
where  his  tomb,  duly  certified  to  by  a number  of  inscrip- 
tions in  stone,  is  supposed  to  exist  at  the  present  day. 

§ 8.  Chuan-hu  (2510-2433  b.c.) 

The  people  of  China  had  not  been  greatly  pleased  with 
the  government  of  the  defunct  emperor,  and  they,  therefore, 
selected  from  the  princes  of  the  imperial  house  as  his  sue- 


MYTHOLOGICAL  AND  LEGENDARY 


25 


cessor  not  the  eldest-born,  but  the  one  whom  they  thought 
the  most  worthy  of  the  position;  namely,  Kau-yang,  a 
grandson  of  Huang-ti,  who  ascended  the  throne  imder  the 
name  of  Chuan-hii.  The  new  monarch  had  received  a 
most  careful  education  from  his  early  childhood.  His  first 
step  was  directed  against  the  spread  of  those  heretical 
superstitious  doctrines  which,  under  the  careless  rule  of  his 
predecessor,  had  gained  the  upper  hand  in  public  life. 
The  sacrificial  service  was  reorganized,  and  in  astronomy 
progress  was  made  which  led  to  further  improvements  in 
the  calendar.  The  limits  of  the  empire  were  considerably 
extended  under  his  rule,  and  it  M'as  divided  into  nine 
provinces.  Chuan-hii  had  several  wives.  From  the  son  of 
his  first  sprang  the  great  Emperor  Yii,  and  by  one  of  his 
concubines  the  Emperor  Shun  was  his  descendant.  At  his 
death  he  left  the  empire  in  a most  flourishing  condition. 

§ 9.  Ti-k’u  (2432-2363  b.c.) 

Ti-k’u,  who  was  not  one  of  the  princes  of  the  family,  was 
elected  emperor  on  the  strength  of  his  good  qualities. 
Under  his  rule  public  schools  were  established,  and  the 
science  of  music  was  greatly  improved.  He  married  three 
wives  in  succession,  and  having  no  child  by  any  of  them, 
took  a fourth,  who  gave  birth  to  Chi,  his  successor.  After 
Chi’s  birth  his  second  wife  presented  him  with  a son,  who 
afterward  became  the  celebrated  Emperor  Yau,  while  a 
son  born  by  his  third  wife  had  among  his  lineal  descendants 
some  centuries  later  the  Emperor  Ch’ong-t’ang,  the  founder 
of  the  Shang  dynasty.  A posthumous  son,  born  ten 
months  after  the  death  of  Ti-k’u,  by  Kiang-yiian,  his  first 
consort,  became  the  legendary  ancestor  of  the  emperors 


26 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


of  the  Chdu  dynasty.  He  is  well  known  under  the  name  of 
H6u-tsi,  as  the  hero  whose  miraculous  birth  is  described 
in  some  of  the  popular  ballads  of  the  Ski-king,  or  “ Book  of 
Odes.”  ‘ 


§ 10.  Ti-cm  (2362-2358  b.c.) 

C!!hi,  or  Ti-chi  (i.e.  “Emperor  Chi”),  is  represented  as 
an  incapable  ruler.  After  he  had  reigned  about  six  years, 
the  people  and  government  officials,  growing  impatient  of 
his  licentiousness,  deposed  him  by  a coup  d’  etat  and  placed 
his  step-brother  Yau  on  the  throne. 

* Vol.  iii  of  The  Chinese  Classics:  with  a Translation,  Critical  and 
Exegetical  Notes,  Prolegomena,  and  Copious  Indexes,  by  James  Legge, 
D.D.,  of  the  London  Missionary  Society.  In  seven  volumes,  Hong- 
kong, 1861-1872.  Of  these  seven  volumes  only  five  have  appeared, 
but  since  volumes  iii  to  v have  been  published  in  two  parts  each, 
the  set  practically  contains  eight  complete  volumes.  The  several 
volumes,  as  originally  planned,  have  the  following  contents:  vol.  i: 
The  Confucian  Analects  (Lun-yii),  The  Great  Learning  (Ta-hio),  and 
The  Doctrine  of  the  Mean  (Chung-yung) ; vol.  ii:  Mencius;  vol.  iii: 
The  Shoo  king  {Shu-king);  vol.  iv:  The  She  king  (Shi-king);  vol.  v: 
The  Ch’un  Ts’ew  {Ch’un-ts’iu),  with  the  Tso  Chuen  (Tso-chuan).  In 
quoting  from  Legge’ s translations  and  notes  I shall  in  the  sequel  refer 
to  the  original  edition  and  refrain  from  repeating  the  complete  titles 
of  the  several  volumes,  naming  the  classic  in  my  own  spelling,  e.g. 
“Shi-king,  ed.  Legge,  p.  123.”  It  should  be  noted  that  second  edi- 
tions of  these  works  have  been  published  since  1893,  in  which  the 
numbering  of  pages  may  deviate  from  those  referred  to  in  my  quo- 
tations. For  bibliographical  notices  of  works  on  the  Chinese  Classics, 
see  Cordier,  Bibliotheca  Sinica,  2d  ed.,  Paris,  1906,  p.  1364  seqq. 


THE  CONFUCIAN  LEGENDS 


II 


THE  CONFUCIAN  LEGENDS 

§ 11.  Yau  (2357-2258  b.c.) 

YAU  and  his  successor  Shun  are  perhaps  the  most  pop- 
ular figures  in  Chinese  history  as  taught  in  China. 
Whatever  estimable  qualities  can  be  imagined  in 
great  and  good  rulers  have  been  ascribed  to  them.  Chi- 
nese literature  is  full  of  their  praises,  and  the  records  of 
their  deeds  as  appearing  in  the  Shu-king  of  Confucius  and 
the  Shi-ki  of  Ssi-ma  Ts’i4n  may  be  looked  upon  as  the 
true  “Mirror  of  Princes,”  held  up  as  a canon  of  an  emper- 
or’s good  conduct  to  after  generations.  In  the  Shu-king 
the  “Canon  of  Yau”  serves  as  an  introduction  to  that 
venerable  historical  work.  I quote  the  following  from 
Legge’s  translation : ' — 

“ Examining  into  antiquity,  we  find  that  the  Emperor  Yau  was 
called  Fang-hiin.  He  was  reverential,  intelligent,  accomplished, 
and  thoughtful  — naturally  and  without  effort.  He  was  sincerely 
courteous,  and  capable  of  all  complaisance.  The  display  of  these 
qualities  reached  to  the  four  extremities  of  the  empire,  and  ex- 
tended from  earth  to  heaven.  He  was  able  to  make  the  able  and 
virtuous  distinguished,  and  thence  proceeded  to  the  love  of  the  nine 
classes  of  his  kindred,  who  all  became  harmonious.  He  also  regu- 
lated and  polished  the  people  of  his  domain,  who  all  became  brightly 
intelligent.  Finally,  he  united  and  harmonized  the  myriad  states 
of  the  empire ; and  lo  I the  black-haired  people  were  transformed. 
The  result  was  imiversal  concord.” 

* Shu-king,  p.  15. 

29 


30 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


After  this  the  compiler  of  the  Shu-king  plunges  right  into 
the  annals  of  Yau’s  reign,  by  telling  us  that  he  ordered 
Hi  and  Ho,  whoever  these  worthies  may  have  been,  to 
“Observe  the  Heavens,  calculate  and  delineate  the  move- 
ments of  the  sun,  the  moon,  the  stars,  and  the  zodiacal 
spaces;  and  so  deUver  respectfully  the  seasons  to  the 
people.” 

Hi  and  Ho  appear  to  be  family  names,  since  in  the  sequel, 
“Hi,  the  second  brother,”  “Hi,  the  third  brother,”  etc., 
are  mentioned  as  office-bearers.  The  several  brothers  were 
to  make  astronomical  observations  in  the  distant  parts  of 
the  empire.  Tliis  ancient  record,  if  it  were  a true  record 
of  the  twenty-third  century  b.c.,  would  reveal  quite  an 
advanced  state  of  astronomical  science.  To  judge  from  it, 
Yau  must  be  credited  with  a knowledge  of  the  astronomical 
year,  consisting  of  366  days,  and  of  other  facts  which  none 
but  the  most  accurate  observation  could  have  revealed  to 
primeval  man.  Quite  a library  of  books  and  papers  has 
appeared  on  the  knowledge  of  astronomy  possessed  by  the 
ancient  Chinese.  Names  like  Deguignes,  Gaubil,  Biot, 
and  Schlegel  being  among  those  of  the  chief  investigators, 
much  acumen  has  been  brought  to  bear  in  proving  the 
accuracy  of  the  statements  made  in  these  ancient  records. 
On  the  other  side  are  the  skeptics,  who  maintain  that  the 
form  of  the  original  text  of  the  Shu-king  must  have  been 
changed  by  later  interpolations,  and  that  later  editors 
introduced  statements  that  could  have  been  made  only 
with  the  astronomical  knowledge  possessed  by  their  own 
contemporaries.  Confucius  himself  may  have  felt  tempted 
to  date  back  by  some  fifty  generations  what  was,  after  all, 
not  quite  so  old  an  acquisition.  It  must  certainly  be 
admitted  that  the  question  is  very  complicated ; and  I,  for 


THE  CONFUCIAN  LEGENDS 


31 


one,  as  a non-expert  in  such  matters,  would  not  dare  to 
pose  as  judge. 

During  Yau’s  reign  immdations,  reminding  one,  in  their 
graphic  descriptions,  of  the  Biblical  deluge,  threatened  the 
Chinese  world.  For  these  the  emperor  blamed  Kun,  his 
minister  of  works,  whom  he  is  said  to  have  addressed  in  the 
following  words ; “0  chief  of  the  four  mountains,  destruc- 
tive in  their  overflow  are  the  waters  of  the  inundation.  In 
their  vast  extent  they  embrace  the  mountains  and  overtop 
the  hills,  threatening  the  heavens  with  their  floods,  so  that 
the  inferior  people  groan  and  murmur.”  ^ Nine  years  were 
spent  in  trying  to  stop  the  floods,  when  the  emperor,  after 
a reign  of  seventy  years,  wished  to  abdicate.  He  offered 
the  throne  to  one  of  his  trusted  ministers,  who  declined  it 
as  being  unworthy  of  it.  “ Point  out  some  one  among  the 
illustrious  or  set  forth  one  from  among  the  poor  and  mean,” 
the  emperor  suggested.  His  advisers  thereupon  unani- 
mously agreed  that  a certain  young  man  named  Shun,  one 
of  the  emperor’s  lowliest  subjects,  was  the  most  qualified. 
The  monarch  sent  for  him  and  married  him  to  his  two 
daughters. 

§ 12.  Shun  (2258-2206  b.c.) 

Shun,  as  may  be  seen  from  the  way  in  which  he  is  intro- 
duced in  the  Shu-king,  was  a self-made  man.  After  the 
death  of  Yau  in  2258,  he  entered  on  a period  of  mourning 
lasting  three  years,  which  the  Chinese  historians  do  not 
look  upon  as  part  of  his  reign.  He  organized  the  adminis- 
tration of  the  empire,  which  he  divided  into  eight  branches. 
Before  his  palace  he  had  a board  on  which  every  subject 
was  permitted  to  note  whatever  faults  he  had  to  find  with 
* Shu-king,  ed.  Legge,  p.  24. 


32 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


his  government ; and  by  means  of  a drum  suspended  at  his 
palace  gate  attention  might  be  drawn  to  any  complaint 
that  was  to  be  made  to  him.  He  banished  Kun,  the 
official  whom  Yau  had  called  upon  to  stop  the  inundations, 
owing  to  his  incapacity  in  improving  matters,  and  ap- 
pointed the  disgraced  officer’s  son  Yii  to  carry  out  the 
labors  neglected  so  much  by  his  father. 

§ 13.  The  Hia  Dynasty  (2205-1766  b.c.) 

This  is  the  first  continuous  dynasty  of  what  native 
authors  consider  to  be  the  history  of  China.  I propose  to 
notice  merely  the  important  details  of  the  epoch,  which 
certainly  cannot  be  regarded  as  history  in  the  strictest 
sense.  Tlie  name  of  the  dynasty  is  derived  from  its  first 
emperor’s  honorary  title  Hia-po,  i.e.  “Earl  of  Hia,”  or 
Yu-hia,  literally  “having  or  possessing  Hia,”  i.e.  “Holder 
of  the  fief  of  Hia,”  given  him  by  the  Emperor  Shun  as  a 
reward  for  his  services  in  draining  the  empire  from  the 
floods.  The  second  title,  Yu-hia,  may  be  compared  to 
Huang-ti’s  title  Yu-hiung  and  to  a similar  title  Yu-yii, 
“Holder  of  the  fief  of  Yii,”  by  which  the  Emperor  Shun 
is  sometimes  designated.  These  and  a number  of  other 
combinations  occurring  in  the  oldest  history  show  clearly 
that  the  character  yu,  “to  have,  to  hold,”  has  a recognized 
standard  meaning  in  such  names,  and  that  De  Lacouperie’s 
manipulations  in  joining  the  name  of  his  fief  to  that  of 
the  Emperor  Huang-ti  are,  as  I have  already  stated,  not 
justified. 

§ 14.  Yii,  OR  Ta-yu  (2205-2198  b.c.) 

The  deeds  of  the  Emperor  Yii,  or  Ta-yii,  “the  Great  Yii,” 
as  he  is  often  called,  have  been  set  forth  in  the  Shu-king, 


THE  CONFUCIAN  LEGENDS 


33 


the  compilation  of  which  from  records  supposed  to  have 
existed  before  his  time  is,  perhaps  wrongly,  ascribed  to 
Confucius,  who  died  in  479  b.c.  Anyhow,  the  Shu-king 
is  the  oldest  source  for  the  pre-Confucian  history  of  China. 
According  to  later  authorities,  Yii  was  a native  of  the  prov- 
ince of  Ssi-ch’uan,  where  his  name  has  survived  in  numerous 
legends.  According  to  Ssi-ma  Ts’ien  he  was  a descendant 
of  the  Emperor  Huang-ti,  though  none  of  his  ancestors 
held  the  throne.  His  father,  Kun,  had,  as  we  have  seen, 
been  commissioned  by  the  Emperor  Yau  to  arrest  certain 
inundations  in  the  empire,  he  having  been  selected  for  that 
Herculean  task  on  the  unanimous  advice  of  the  govern- 
ment officials  against  the  monarch’s  own  opinion.  Kun’s 
attempts,  however,  ended  in  failure.  It  is  a characteristic 
feature  of  the  history  of  these  early  emperors,  especially 
Yau  and  Shun,  who  are  held  up  to  all  the  world  as  models 
of  what  good  rulers  should  be,  that  in  all  such  important 
selections  they  were  guided  by  the  advice  of  their  ministers. 
This,  it  appears  to  me,  is  very  suggestive  as  to  the  class  of 
persons  who  were  chiefly  influential  in  inventing  the  Chinese 
“model  emperor  lore,”  as  we  may  call  that  part  of  Chinese 
history,  taking  it  for  granted  that  in  such  cases  the  wish 
was  father  to  the  thought. 

It  is  reasonable  to  assume  that  not  an  independent  his- 
torian, but  certain  parties  interested  in  raising  the  impor- 
tance of  their  own  class  invented  or  modified  the  old  records 
so  as  to  lay  the  intellectual  fatherhood  of  great  decisions 
on  ministers  or  philosophical  advisers.  All  those  gushing 
speeches  of  emperors  and  their  ministers,  placed  on  record 
in  the  Shu-king,  may  well  be  said,  as  Baron  von  Richthofen 
remarks, ‘ to  have  been  placed  together  by  their  compilers, 
* China,  vol.  i,  p.  279. 


34 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


in  order  to  express  the  fundamental  ideas  of  political  and 
social  government  and  to  illustrate  the  way  of  handling 
them  in  the  earliest  times.  The  monarch  asks,  “Whom 
shall  I appoint?”  The  ministers  propose,  and  the  emperor 
cheerfully  adopts  their  advice.  Yau  had  made  an  unfortu- 
nate move  in  appointing  Kun,  who,  by  his  being  the  de- 
scendant of  Huang-ti,  may  have  commanded  more  personal 
influence  than  talent.  Yii  may  have  benefited  by  the  dis- 
asters experienced  by  his  father.  His  education  must  have 
given  him  frequent  opportunities  to  study  the  causes  of 
the  floods  then  devastating  China  and  the  means  to  stop 
them,  and  it  is  quite  possible  that  he  succeeded  in  some 
matters  of  detail.  But  if  we  read  the  accounts  of  what 
the  great  prehistoric  engineer  is  supposed  to  have  brought 
about,  we  are  bound  to  agree  with  the  view  expressed  by 
Biot,  Legge,  and  Von  Richthofen,  the  last  mentioned  of 
whom'  is  of  opinion  that  the  oldest  account  of  Yii’s  labors, 
as  contained  in  that  part  of  the  Shu-king  known  under  the 
name  of  Yu-kung  (“Tribute  of  Yii”),  is  much  more  mod-, 
erate  in  its  statements  and  contains  less  of  the  wonderful 
than  the  later  commentaries  on  it.  From  these  later  views, 
which  may  be  said  to  represent  the  belief  of  the  modern 
Chinese,  it  would  appear  that  Yii  cut  canals  through  the 
hills,  in  order  to  furnish  outlets  to  the  floods;  that  he  visited 
the  several  provinces  of  the  empire  and  all  the  mountain 
ranges  and  cut  down  forests;  that  he  traced  each  river  to 
its  source  and  back  again  to  its  mouth,  in  order  to  clear  its 
spring,  regulate  its  course,  deepen  its  bed,  raise  embank- 
ments, and  change  its  direction,  — in  other  words,  that  he 
performed  work,  compared  to  which,  as  Von  Richthofen 
justly  remarks,  the  construction  of  the  St.  Gotthard  tunnel 
* Op.  cil.,  p.  286. 


THE  CONFUCIAN  LEGENDS 


35 


without  blasting  materials  would  be  child’s  play,  and  all 
this  within  a few  years. 

If  we  lean  at  all  toward  the  assumption  that  these  ancient 
records  have  been  constructed  upon  a historical  basis,  it 
will  be  necessary  to  free  them  of  what  we  may  call  the 
poetical  exaggeration  which  led  the  old  historians  to  repre- 
sent the  work  of  man  as  that  of  a god.  Accounts  of  a great 
deluge  occur  in  other  literatures.  Who  knows  how  much 
has  been  added  to  them  by  the  imagination  of  later  genera- 
tions ? 

Such  poetical  exaggeration  would  in  the  first  instance 
induce  historians  to  represent  the  inundations  as  much 
more  in  the  way  of  a catastrophe  than  they  may  have 
actually  been.  The  Emperor  Yau,  according  to  the  Shu- 
king,  describes  the  great  deluge  as  embracing  the  mountains 
and  overtopping  the  hills,  threatening  the  heavens  with 
their  floods.  How  can  such  language  possibly  refer  to  phe- 
nomena witnessed  at  any  time  in  any  part  of  the  globe  ? 
Does  it  not  rather  recall  a poetical  figure  like  Schiller’s 
“Bis  zum  Himmel  spritzte  der  dampfende  Gischt”? 
Similarly,  a considerable  allowance  may  have  to  be  made 
on  account  of  exaggeration  in  the  description  of  Yii’s 
efforts  to  stop  the  floods,  which  may  have  subsided  of 
their  own  accord  after  a number  of  years.  It  appears  to 
me  that  Yii’s  father  is  not  to  be  blamed  for  being  unable 
to  cope  with  the  catastrophe,  when  it  had  reached  its  culmi- 
nation, nor  does  Yii  himself  deserve  the  credit,  cheerfully 
given  him  by  his  contemporaries,  of  having  stopped  the 
floods  by  his  own  exertions.  Of  course,  his  people  were 
only  too  glad  to  raise  him  to  the  pedestal  of  a national  hero 
as  an  expression  of  the  relief  they  felt  after  the  floods  had 
subsided.  I look  upon  the  story  of  the  Emperor  Yii  as  an 


36 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


early  manifestation  of  what  has  continued  to  be  a charac- 
teristically Chinese  view  down  to  the  present  day.  The 
emperor  is  generally  responsible  for  natural  phenomena. 
It  is  he  who  has  to  address  Heaven  and  pray  for  rain  after 
a long  drought ; and  to  his  prayer  is  due  the  credit  of  relief, 
when  it  comes.  It  seems  quite  consistent  with  the  Chinese 
character  that  the  merits  of  a man  credited  with  almost 
supernatural  powers  by  his  contemporaries  should  have 
been  so  grossly  exaggerated  by  succeeding  generations. 

The  most  interesting  document  referring  to  this  period 
in  the  Shu-king  is  the  above-mentioned  “Tribute  of  Yii.” 
In  it  the  nine  provinces  into  which  Yu  divided  his  empire 
are  described  with  their  products  in  that  terse,  archaic  lan- 
guage peculiar  to  the  oldest  records  of  all  nations.  The 
incidents  related  in  this  account  correspond  fairly  with 
those  in  the  accounts  written  within  the  historical  period, 
and  this  is  just  the  reason  why  some  critics  are  of  opinion 
that  they  may  be  interpolations  of  a later  date. 

The  late  Professor  James  Legge,  of  Oxford,  to  whose 
edition  of  the  Shu-king  the  reader  may  be  referred  for  the 
original  text,  translation,  and  critical  apparatus,  took  an 
entirely  skeptical  view  with  regard  to  the  doings  of  Yii. 
“If  we  allow,”  he  says,'  “that  all  the  resources  of  the  em- 
pire, so  to  speak,  were  at  his  disposal,  the  work  which  he 
is  said  to  have  accomplished  far  exceeds  all  limits  of  credi- 
bility.” Legge  quotes  Edouard  Biot  the  younger,  who 
says:^ — 

“The  Yellow  River,  after  its  entrance  into  China,  has  a further 
course  of  560  leagues;  the  Kiang,  taken  only  from  the  great  lake 
of  Hu-kuang  visited  by  Yii,  has  a course  of  nearly  250  leagues;  the 

‘ Shu-king,  Prolegomena,  p.  59.  ^ Memoire  sur  le  chapitre  Yu-kong 

du  Chou-king,  etc.,  in  Journal  Asiatique,  3d  series,  vol.  xiv,  p.  160. 


THE  CONFUCIAN  LEGENDS 


37 


Han,  from  its  source  to  its  junction  with  the  Kiang,  is  150  leagues 
long.  These  three  rivers  present  a total  length  of  nearly  1000 
leagues;  and,  adding  the  other  rivers  (on  which  Yii  laboured),  we 
must  extend  the  1000  to  1500.  . . . Chinese  antiquity  has  pro- 
duced one  monument  of  immense  labour, — the  Great  Wall,  which 
extends  over  nearly  300  leagues;  but  the  achievement  of  this 
gigantic  monument  required  a great  number  of  years.  It  was 
commenced  in  pieces,  in  the  ancient  states  of  Ts’in,  Chau,  and  Yen, 
and  was  then  repaired  and  lengthened  by  the  first  emperor  of  the 
Ts’in  dynasty.  Now  such  a structure,  in  masonry,  is  much  easier 
to  make  than  the  embankment  of  enormous  streams  along  an  ex- 
tent of  1200  or  1500  leagues.  We  know,  in  effect,  how  much  trouble 
and  time  are  required  to  bring  such  works  to  perfect  solidity.  We 
can  judge  it  from  the  repeated  overflowings  of  the  Rhone ; and  the 
lower  Rhone  is  not  a fourth  of  the  size  of  the  Ho  and  the  Kiang  in 
the  lower  part  of  their  course.  If  we  were  to  believe  the  commenta- 
tors, Yii  would  be  a supernatural  being,  who  could  lead  the  immense 
rivers  of  China  as  if  he  had  been  engaged  in  regulating  the  course 
of  feeble  streamlets.” 

Legge  continues : — 

“These  illustrations  of  Biot  are  sufficiently  conclusive.  I 
may  put  the  matter  before  the  reader  by  one  of  a different 
character.  I have  represented  the  condition  of  the  surface  of 
China  when  Yii  entered  on  his  labours  by  supposing  the  regions 
of  North  America,  from  the  St.  Lawrence  southward,  to  have  been 
found  in  similar  disorder  and  desolation  by  the  early  colonists  from 
Europe  in  the  seventeenth  century.  Those  colonists  had  not  the 
difficulties  to  cope  with  which  confronted  Yii;  but  we  know  how 
slowly  they  pushed  their  way  into  the  country.  Gradually  growing 
in  numbers,  receiving  constant  accessions  from  Europe,  increasing 
to  a great  nation  inferior  to  no  other  in  the  world  for  intelligence  and 
enterprise,  in  more  than  two  centuries  they  have  not  brought  their 
territory  more  extensively  into  cultivation  and  order  than  Yii  did 
the  inundated  regions  of  China  in  the  space  of  less  than  twenty 
years ! 

“The  empire  as  it  appears  in  ‘The  Tribute  of  Yii’  consisted  of 
nine  provinces.  On  the  north  and  the  west  its  boundaries  were 


38 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


much  the  same  as  those  of  China  Proper  at  the  present  day.  On 
the  east  it  extended  to  the  sea,  and  even,  according  to  many, 
across  it,  so  as  to  embrace  the  territory  of  Corea.  Its  limits  on 
the  south  are  not  very  well  defined.  It  certainly  did  not  reach  be- 
yond the  range  of  mountains  which  runs  along  the  north  of  Kuang- 
tung  province,  stretching  into  Kuang-si  on  the  w'est  and  Fu-kien 
on  the  east.  Even  though  we  do  not  reckon  those  three  provinces 
in  Yii’s  dominion,  there  still  remains  an  immense  empire,  about 
three  times  as  large  as  France,  which  we  are  to  suppose  was  ruled 
over  by  him,  the  chief  of  K’i,  and  the  different  regions  of  which  sent 
their  apportioned  contributions  of  grain  and  other  articles  of  trib- 
ute to  his  capital  year  by  year.” 

The  reader  will  find  most  valuable  material  regarding 
the  Emperor  Yii’s  exploits,  and  more  particularly  the 
geographical  features  of  the  Yu-kung,  in  volume  i of  Von 
Richthofen’s  well-known  work  China.  I look  upon  this 
author  as  an  absolute  authority  in  his  own  field,  the  geology 
and  geography  of  the  world,  including  that  of  China;  but 
I draw  a sharp  line  between  this  cheerfully  acknowledged 
competency  and  the  treatment  of  philological  problems, 
the  solution  of  which  is  dependent  upon  a knowledge  of 
the  Chinese  language  and  literature. 

§ 15.  Yii’s  Successors 

None  of  the  sixteen  successors  of  the  great  Yu  is  credited 
with  any  particular  brilliancy  of  character,  and  it  looks  as 
if  the  story  of  their  government  had  been  written  merely  to 
give  relief  to  the  great  Confucian  idols  Yau,  Shun,  and  Yii. 

Yii  had  the  intention  to  select  a clever  man  rather  than 
his  own  son  as  his  successor,  but  yielded  to  the  advice  of 
his  ministers  in  leaving  the  empire  to  the  rightful  heir, 
K’i,  or  Ti-k’i,  “Emperor  K’i”  (2197-2189  b.c.). 

Tlie  people  and  his  ministers  having  been  highly  satisfied 


THE  CONFUCIAN  LEGENDS 


39 


with  Yii  as  a worthy  monarch,  the  rule  hitherto  observed  in 
selecting  a successor  from  some  other  family  was  broken ; and 
from  this  precedent,  the  Chinese  say,  dates  the  practice  of 
later  ages  in  securing  the  succession  to  one  of  the  emperor’s 
own  sons.  Ti-k’i  enjoyed  the  confidence  of  all  his  federal 
lords  except  one,  Yu-hou,  “Holder  of  the  fief  of  Hou,”  who 
refused  to  render  allegiance  to  and  took  up  arms  against 
him.  With  the  assistance  of  his  adherents,  however,  the 
emperor  vanquished  him;  so^that  Ti-k’i  at  his  death,  wfiiich 
occurred  after  a reign  of  about  nine  years,  was  able  to 
leave  the  empire  in  good  order  to  his  eldest  son,  T’ai-k’ang. 

T’ai-k’ang  (2188-2160  b.c.)  gave  himself  up  to  a gay 
life  amid  convivial  pleasures,  women,  and  the  chase. 
But  for  the  fact  that  he  was  a grandson  of  the  great  Yii, 
the  people  would  have  revolted  against  him,  since  he  spoiled 
their  harvests  by  his  hunting  parties.  All  remonstrances 
on  the  part  of  his  ministers  were  in  vain.  Among  the 
latter  one  H6u-i,  “Holder  of  the  fief  of  K’iung”  (yu-k’iung), 
planned  a coup  d’etat.  Taking  advantage  of  the  emperor’s 
protracted  absence  on  one  of  his  hunting  expeditions,  he 
intercepted  him  with  an  army,  and,  making  him  prisoner, 
offered  the  throne  to  T’ai-k’ang’s  brother,  named  Chung- 
k’ang. 

Chung-k’ang  (2159-2147  b.c.)  was  a much  better  man, 
who  would  not,  however,  assume  the  imperial  dignity  dur- 
ing T’ai-k’ang’s  lifetime,  but  succeeded  him  formally  after 
his  death.  H6u-i  continued  to  be  his  minister,  but,  having 
assumed  greater  authority  than  Chung-k’ang  approved, 
his  public  influence  was  considerably  curtailed.  The  post 
of  general-in-chief  of  the  army,  formerly  held  by  H6u-i,  was 
given  to  his  rival,  the  Prince  of  Yin.  Under  Chung-k’ang 
the  two  court  astronomers  Hi  and  Ho  — whom  we  must 


40 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


suppose  to  be  descendants  of  the  two  brothers  of  the 
same  name  and  holders  of  similar  offices  under  the  Em- 
peror Yau  — were  decapitated  for  having  failed  to  predict 
an  eclipse  of  the  sun  which  took  place  while  the  two  delin- 
quents were  absent  and  given  to  debauchery  instead  of 
attending  to  their  duties. 

Several  ingenious  attempts  have  been  made  to  identify 
the  solar  eclipse  referred  to  in  the  Shu-king  account  of 
Chung-k’ang’s  reign,  the  latest  and  most  plausible  one 
representing  the  joint  labors  of  the  late  Professor  G. 
Schlegel,  author  of  the  great  work  on  Chinese  astronomy, 
" Uranographie  chinoise,”  and  Dr.  F.  Kiihnert  of  Vienna, 
who,  besides  being  a Sinologue,  is  an  astronomer  by  profes- 
sion. It  seems  to  me  that  none  but  a scholar  well  at 
home  in  both  these  sciences  is  able  to  understand  thor- 
oughly this  very  complicated  subject;  but  students  may 
be  referred  to  the  work  itself,  which  is  published  by  the 
Royal  Academy  of  Sciences  of  Amsterdam  under  the  title 
“Die  Schu-king-Finsterniss ” (Amsterdam,  J.  Muller,  1889). 
The  authors  endeavor  to  prove  that  the  eclipse  which  the 
court  astronomers  Hi  and  Ho  failed  to  predict  during 
Chung-k’ang’s  reign,  actually  took  place  on  May  7,  2165 
B.C.,  about  one  hour  after  sunrise  and  that  it  was  plainly 
visible  at  the  time  in  Ho-nan.  Being  an  utter  stranger  to 
astronomical  research,  I am  not  able  to  refute  the  criti- 
cisms of  a well-known  Sinologue,  Dr.  E.  J.  Eitel,  '■  who  has 
the  following  remarks  on  the  subject ; — 

“If  the  date  of  this  eclipse  could  be  fixed  accurately  and  in  a 
manner  bringing  conviction  to  the  mind  of  a vast  majority  of  read- 
ers, all  doubts  as  to  the  reliability  of  the  most  ancient  historical 


' China  Review,  vol.  xviii,  p.  266. 


THE  CONFUCIAN  LEGENDS 


41 


records  that  exist  in  the  world  would  be  removed,  and  the  basis  for 
a connected  outline  of  ancient  Chinese  history  would  be  gained. 
But  although  the  two  professors  bring  together  an  unusual  amount 
of  SLnologiC  and  astronomical  skill,  qualifying  them  for  the  task 
they  have  in  hand,  we  doubt  if  many  readers  will  see  in  the  argu- 
ments here  propounded  any  more  plausible  evidence  in  favor  of 
May  7,  2165  b.c.,  than  Gaubil  advanced  for  October  11,  2154  b.c., 
or  Largeteau  and  Chalmers  (both  working  independently)  for 
October  12,  2127  b.c.,  or  Freret  and  D.  Cassini  for  October  24, 
2006  B.C.,  or  Gumpach  for  October  22,  2155  b.c.,  or  Oppolzer  for 
October  21,  2135  b.c. 

“The  question  is  extremely  complicated,  for  the  following  reasons : 
The  original  reading  of  the  text  of  the  Shu  is  uncertain.  Confucius 
may  have  altered  it  to  bring  it  into  conformity  with  his  imperfect 
astronomical  knowledge,  and  especially  with  his  prejudices  against 
the  possible  reading  of  his  original,  caused  by  his  ignorance  of  the 
precession  of  the  equinoxes.  The  Han  editors,  who,  after  the  burn- 
ing of  the  books,  patched  up  the  lacunae  of  the  ancient  texts  and 
freely  reconstructed  the  Shu,  may  likewise  have  corrected  the 
amended  reading  of  Confucius.  But,  on  the  other  hand,  it  is  also 
possible  that  both  Confucius  and  the  Han  editors  respected  the 
original  reading  of  the  Shu  and  left  it  untouched.  It  is,  in  our 
opinion,  absolutely  impossible  to  get  anything  more  than  plausi- 
bility for  either  view.  Certainty  is  out  of  the  question.”  * 

On  his  death  Chung-k’ang  was  followed  by  his  son  Ti- 
SIANG  (214f>-2119  B.C.). 

What  we  know  about  him  and  Yii’s  successors  generally 
is  chiefly  due  to  the  records  of  the  Bamboo  Books,  and  it 
is  perhaps  characteristic  that  Ssi-ma  Ts’ien  does  not  now 
give  much  more  than  the  names  of  emperors  down  to  Kie. 

Ti-siang,  a man  of  amiable  temper,  was  much  too  yield- 
ing in  disposition  to  escape  being  victimized  by  crafty 
underlings.  He  had  reinstated  H6u-i  in  his  post  as  general- 

* For  the  Chinese  text,  translation,  and  commentary  see  Legge, 
Shu-king,  p.  162  seqq. 


42 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


in-chief;  and  the  latter  earned  great  success  in  subduing 
certain  rebellious  border  nations.  Having  thereby  become 
a favorite  with  the  people,  he  made  use  of  his  power  to 
reduce  the  emperor  to  a mere  shadow.  Ti-siang  was  com- 
pelled to  live  on  the  frontier  of  his  empire,  not  daring  to 
come  to  the  capital,  where  H6u-i  ruled  supreme.  When, 
after  a long  banishment,  he  at  last  returned,  H6u-i  declared 
him  incapable  of  governing  and  deposed  him,  after  he  had 
made  use  of  the  emperor’s  authority  to  get  rid  of  all  the 
officials  that  opposed  his  own  schemes. 

Among  the  adherents  of  H6u-i  was  an  official  named 
Han-cho,  who  succeeded  by  another  cowp  d’etat  in  wrench- 
ing the  empire  from  the  usurper.  H6u-i,  like  his  victim 
Ti-siang,  had  contracted  a passion  for  the  chase,  and  Han- 
cho  made  use  of  that  very  circumstance  which  had  been 
fatal  to  the  emperor.  Seizing  the  government  during  the 
absence  of  H6u-i,  he  caused  the  latter  to  be  murdered  on 
his  return  from  a somewhat  protracted  hunting  party. 
Upon  this  Han-cho  married  Hou-i’s  widow,  by  whom  he 
had  two  sons.  When  he  took  charge  of  the  empire  as  sole 
regent,  the  “shadow  emperor”  Ti-siang  still  lived  in  banish- 
ment; and  the  usurper,  in  order  to  prevent  any  possible 
legitimate  interference  with  his  plans,  induced  his  sons  in 
2119  B.c.  to  kill  the  emperor,  upon  which  the  Hia  dynasty 
was  interrupted  by  the  reign  of 

Han-cho  (2119-2079  b.c.),  characterized  by  the  attempts 
made  by  the  legitimate  emperor’s  family,  notably  his  widow 
and  her  son  with  their  adherents,  to  regain  the  empire. 
In  this  Ti-siang’s  son  succeeded.  He  ascended  the  throne 
under  the  name  of  Shau-k’ang  (2079-2058  b.c.). 

For  the  names  of  ten  of  Shau-k’ang’s  successors  the  reader 
is  referred  to  the  chronological  tables  given  in  the  Appendix. 


THE  CONFUCIAN  LEGENDS 


43 


The  list  of  emperors  of  the  Hia  dynasty  is  closed  by  the 
name  of  one  who  brought  about  its  ruin,  and  this,  with 
Chinese  historians,  is  sufficient  reason  for  describing  him 
as  an  arrant  knave. 

Kie,  known  also  as  Kui,  Ti-kui,  and  Kie-kui  (1818- 
1766  B.C.),  united  in  his  person  the  most  abominable  qualities 
with  which  a ruler  may  possibly  be  charged.  If  the  entire 
story  of  this  first  dynasty  is  an  invention,  the  historians 
have  certainly  shown  method  in  drawing  impressive  sketches 
of  the  great  Yii  and  the  scoundrel  Kie.  It  may  almost  be 
considered  a rule  henceforward  — corresponding  to  what 
is  observed  in  the  history  of  other  nations  — that  the 
founder  of  a dynasty  is  usually  endowed  with  all  the  virtues 
of  a great  man,  whereas  the  one  who  has  the  misfortune  to 
be  the  last  of  a long  and  glorious  line  of  rulers  is,  after  its 
downfall,  credited  with  all  the  known  vices.  Kie  began 
his  reign  by  punishing  those  of  his  vassals  who,  prompted 
by  deep  contempt  of  his  cruel  and  dissolute  character, 
refused  obedience  to  him.  One  of  them,  Yu-shi,  “Holder 
of  the  fief  of  Shi,”  had  a beautiful  daughter  named  Mei-hi, 
and  knowing  the  emperor’s  fatal  weakness  for  female 
charms,  sent  him  the  girl,  with  whom  Kie  became  infatu- 
ated. To  please  the  woman,  who  is  represented  as  gifted 
with  great  intelligence  coupled  with  the  extreme  of  heart- 
lessness, Ki6  gave  himself  up  to  the  most  extravagant 
pleasures  of  which  human  imagination  can  conceive. 
On  the  heads  of  this  couple  have  been  heaped  all  the 
infamies  of  vice  that  history  has  ever  recorded;  and 
the  historians  may  well  be  said  to  have  created  with 
their  account  of  this  disastrous  period  the  prototype  of  all 
that  is  low  and  contemptible  in  human  nature.  The 
details  of  their  abominable  acts  of  terrible  cruelty  are  fully 


44 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


described  by  the  historians  of  the  period,  whose  account  of 
Kie’s  reign  surpasses  everything  recorded  in  the  way  of 
tyranny  in  the  history  of  the  world,  not  excepting  the 
darkest  periods  of  imperial  Rome.  The  reaction  set  in 
under  the  leadership  of  Ch’ong-t’ang,  or  T’ang,  “ the  Com- 
pleter,” Prince  of  Shang,  who,  after  overthrowing  Kie, 
became  the  founder  of  the  house  known  as  the  Shang, 
or  Yin,  dynasty. 


Ill 

THE  SHANG,  OR  YIN,  DYNASTY 
(1766-1122  B.c.) 


Ill 


THE  SHANG,  OR  YIN,  DYNASTY  (1766-1122  b.c.) 

§ 16.  Ch’ong-t’ang  (1766-1754  b.c.) 

This  mler,  whose  rebellion  against  Ki4  dates  from  the 
year  1783,  spent  seventeen  years  in  fighting  the  em- 
peror, who  was  soon  deserted  by  his  former  adherents. 
In  1766  B.c.  Ki6  was  made  a prisoner  and  deposed.  "When 
Ch’ong-t’ang  ascended  the  throne  as  the  founder  of  the 
Shang  dynasty,  he  was  found  to  be  a good  and  virtuous 
ruler.  He  was  full  of  benevolence  not  only  toward  his 
human  subjects,  but  also  toward  the  animal  world.  His 
name  has  become  proverbial  in  connection  with  hunting 
and  fishing,  which  he  sanctioned,  while  taking  measures  to 
prevent  all  cruelty  to  animals.  The  introduction  of  sports- 
manlike treatment  of  these  pastimes  is  ascribed  to  him. 
He  was  succeeded  by  his  grandson. 

§ 17.  Ch’ong-t’ang’s  Successors 

T’ai-kia  (1753-1721  b.c.),  as  a young  man,  was  inclined 
to  be  wayward,  but  I Yin,  the  prudent  minister  of  his 
grandfather,  caused  him  to  withdraw  from  government  for 
three  years,  in  order  to  prepare  for  the  responsible  duties 
awaiting  him,  after  which  he  returned  to  the  capital. 

I Yin  must  have  been  a man  of  great  power,  and  he 
should  be  regarded  as  the  chief  agent  in  consolidating  the 

47 


48 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHLNA 


empire  under  the  first  three  rulers  of  the  dynasty.  He 
had  greatly  assisted  Ch’ong-t’ang  in  securing  the  throne, 
and  had  remained  his  chief  adviser  throughout  his  life. 
He  now  held  a similar  position  under  T’ai-kia.  He  died  a 
centenarian  in  1714  under  the  reign  of  T’ai-kia’s  son,  Wu- 
TiNG  (1720-1692  B.C.). 

T’ai-kong  (1691-1667  b.c.)  was  the  next  ruler,  and  after 
his  death  T’ai-kong’s  son 

SiAu-KiA  (1666-1650  B.c.) 
was  followed  by  his  younger  brother 

Yung-ki  (1649-1638  b.c.). 

Under  this  reign  the  imperial  authority  became  weak- 
ened, and  when  the  monarch  called  the  princes  of  his 
empire  to  a meeting,  they  declined  to  obey  the  summons. 

T’ai-m6u  (1637-1563  b.c.), 

known  also  under  his  posthumous  name  Chung-tsung,  was 
another  brother  of  Siau-kia  and  Yung-ki.  He  was  fright- 
ened by  the  sudden  growth  of  an  ill-portending  mulberry 
tree  and  a stalk  of  grain.  He  consulted  his  minister 
I Chi  as  to  the  meaning  of  this  omen.  I Chi,  who  was  of 
opinion  that  sorcery  ought  to  be  powerless  against  virtue, 
ascribed  the  phenomenon  to  the  emperor’s  lack  of  good 
qualities.  Tlie  monarch  took  the  hint  and  resolved  to 
start  a new  life,  upon  which  the  dangerous  plants  withered 
away.  Tlie  result  was  that  the  princes  of  the  erhpire,  who 
had  refused  to  do  obeisance  to  his  brother,  hastened  to 
tender  their  allegiance.  He  was  followed  by  his  son 

Chung-ting  (1562-1550  b.c.). 

This  youthful  monarch  did  not  share  his  father’s  good 
luck  in  having  the  assistance  of  an  excellent  adviser  like  the 
prime  minister  I Chi,  who  had  died  soon  after  his  master. 
Tlie  neighboring  states  refused  their  former  vassalage  and 


THE  SHAXG,  OR  YIX,  DYNASTY  (1766-1122  b.c.)  49 


made  the  reign  one  of  constant  warfare.  China’s  sorrow, 
the  Yellow  River,  added  to  these  misfortunes  a serious 
inundation,  which  threatened  with  destruction  the  imperial 
capital,  situated  in  the  adjacent  lowlands.  The  capital 
was,  therefore,  again  transferred  to  a more  favorable  place 
in  the  present  province  of  Ho-nan.  Chung-ting  died  child- 
less after  a reign  of  thirteen  years.  He  was  followed  by  his 
brother 

Wai-jon  (1549-1535  b.c.), 

a boy  of  fifteen,  who  at  his  death  left  the  empire  to  another 
brother  of  Chung-ting’s, 

Ho-tan-kia  (153T-1526  b.c.), 
who  again  changed  his  residence  owing  to  the  Yellow  River 
troubles.  He  had  taken  good  care  to  give  his  son  an  edu- 
cation qualifying  him  for  his  responsible  duties,  and  the 
latter  succeeded  him  under  the  name  of 

Tsu-i  (1525-1507  b.c.). 

He  was  a peaceful  ruler  and  enjoyed  the  benefit  of  being 
assisted  by  a clever  minister.  Tlie  capital  was,  dui’ing  his 
reign,  repeatedly  shifted,  but  he  left  the  empire  in  good 
condition. 

The  greater  part  of  the  history  of  this  d}Tiasty  is  merely  a 
series  of  names ; and  the  chronology  of  the  rulers  to  whom 
these  names  belong  has  been  fixed  by  later  generations 
with  the  assistance  of  records  which  may  possibly  have 
existed  two  thousand  years  ago,  but  have  not  come  down 
to  us.  From  Tsu-i  down  to  the  end  of  the  dynasty  the 
names  of  seventeen  rulers  are  recorded,  and  these  are  given 
in  the  chronological  tables  appended  to  this  work.  The 
degree  of  relationship  in  which  these  monarchs  stand  to 
each  other  is  immaterial. 

Many  of  these  names  are  mentioned  in  the  Shu-king,  but 


50 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


the  detail  of  the  history  of  this  dynasty,  with  the  material 
placing  the  philologist  in  the  position  to  reconstruct  some 
sort  of  chronology,  is  found  in  another  ancient  record  known 
as  Chu-shu-ki-nien,  i.e.  “Annals  of  the  Bamboo  Books,” 
which  contain  the  history  and  chronology  of  Chinese  em- 
perors from  Huang-ti  nearly  to  the  end  of  the  Ch6u 
dynasty.  These  records  were  discovered  about  the  year 
280  A.D.  A native  of  the  district  of  Ki  in  the  north  of  the 
present  province  of  Ho-nan  had  committed  what,  according 
to  Chinese  views,  would  be  considered  a great  indiscretion 
in  excavating  the  tomb  of  a prince  of  the  Ch6u  dy- 
nasty, whose  remains  had  rested  there  in  peace  for  well- 
nigh  six  hundred  years.  The  record  from  which  we  learn 
this  fact  duly  insinuates  that  the  man  had  no  permission 
to  do  so;  yet  he  did  it  to  the  great  delight  of  the  philolo- 
gists of  the  period.  It  had  been  customary,  as  may  be 
concluded  from  similar  cases  well  known  in  the  history  of 
Chinese  literature,  to  bury  with  the  worldly  remains  of 
great  folks  not  only  weapons  and  armor,  but  also  valuable 
manuscripts.  Thus  it  came  about  that  one  of  the  princi- 
pal sources  of  the  oldest  history  down  to  the  year  299  b.c. 
was  preserved.  The  text  containing  these  annals  was  in- 
scribed on  a number  of  bamboo  tablets,  the  time-honored 
mode  of  writing  prior  to  the  invention  of  more  handy 
writing  materials.  It  was  written  in  characters,  the  deci- 
phering of  which  had  to  be  intrusted  to  the  experts  of  the 
day,  who  had  also  to  make  use  of  their  philological  acu- 
men in  arranging  it,  before  it  could  be  inserted  in  duly 
transcribed  copies  among  the  treasures  of  the  imperial  li- 
brary. We  have  no  more  reason  to  doubt  the  bona  fides 
of  the  philological  work  done  in  connection  with  it  than 
we  are  accustomed  to  doubt  the  tradition  of  many  a his- 


THE  SHANG,  OR  YIN,  DYNASTY  (1766-1122  b.c.)  51 


torical  work  of  Greek  or  Roman  origin;  and  sound  argu- 
ments may  be  brought  forward  to  support  the  belief  in  its 
genuineness.  ‘ 

Although  discrepancies  of  considerable  weight  exist  in 
its  tradition  as  compared  with  the  Shu-king,  the  oldest 
text  treating  of  the  most  ancient  history,  and  the  great 
historical  work  of  Ssi-ma  Ts’ien,  the  Sh'i-ki,  originating  in 
the  beginning  of  the  first  century  b.c.,  such  as  they  are  the 
Annals  of  the  Bamboo  Books  are  the  most  detailed  record, 
as  far  as  they  go,  of  the  earliest  periods  of  Chinese  history. 

Among  the  discrepancies  the  one  most  conspicuous  is 
the  chronology  of  the  early  legendary  periods.  I have,  in 
the  dates  assigned  to  these  emperors,  followed  what  may 
be  called  the  standard  view  of  Chinese  chronologists. 
The  Bamboo  Books  differ  from  them  considerably.  The 
Emperor  Huang-ti’s  reign,  which  began  in  2704  b.c. 
according  to  the  standard  computation,  is  made  to  date 
more  than  two  himdred  years  later,  i.e.  from  2491  b.c., 
in  the  Bamboo  Annals.  The  difference  diminishes  gradu- 
ally later  on,  but  still  amounts  to  more  than  fifty  years 
at  the  end  of  the  Shang  dynasty,  until  it  disappears 
altogether  about  the  middle  of  the  ninth  century  b.c. 

Ssi-ma  Ts’ien,  with  true  historical  spirit,  refrains  from 
any  attempt  at  exact  chronology  prior  to  the  year  841  b.c. 
In  the  Genealogical  Table  inserted  in  the  thirteenth  book 

‘ Cf.  Legge,  Shu-king,  Prolegomena,  p.  105  seqq.,  where  the  text  is 
reproduced  with  an  introduction,  a careful  translation,  and  critical 
notes;  also  Ed.  Chavannes,  Les  memoires  historiques,  vol.  i.  Intro- 
duction, p.  clxxxviii,  and  especially  vol.  v,  pp.  446-479,  appendix  i, 
where  the  most  exhaustive  monograph  on  the  archaeological  merits 
of  the  work  and  the  history  of  its  discovery  will  be  found.  A French 
translation  with  introduction  and  notes  was  published  by  Ed.  Biot  in 
the  Journal  Asiatique,  3d  series,  vol.  xii,  pp.  537-578,  and  vol.  xiii, 
pp.  381-431. 


52 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


of  his  work,  he  merely  gives  names  and  generations  for 
the  preceding  periods ; and,  from  the  indications  he  makes, 
it  seems  that  his  chronology,  vague  though  it  has  been 
left  for  good  reasons,  comes  nearer  that  of  the  Bamboo 
Books  than  our  standard  figures^  Altogether,  too  much 
stress  should  not  be  laid  on  dates  of  any  kind  previous  to 
the  Chou  dynasty.^ 

What  we  learn  from  the  Bamboo  Books  about  the  Shang 
dynasty  is  dry  and  uninteresting.  I am  inclined  to  look 
upon  this  as  an  argument  supporting  the  confidence  to  be 
placed  in  it.  The  accounts  of  the  early  legendary  emperors 
are  much  more  detailed:  they  are  attractive  when  com- 
pared with  the  terse  entries  appearing  under  the  Shang 
dynasty  in  that  old  chronicle;  and  this,  considering  the 
remoteness  of  the  period,  is  bound  to  cause  suspicion. 
Very  little  need  be  said  about  the  long  array  of  names  I 
have  referred  to  of  rulers  of  that  dynasty  as  belonging  to 
the  fifteenth  down  to  the  twelfth  century.  The  beginning 
of  the  fourteenth  century  saw  P’an-kong  (I40I-I374  b.c.), 
who  for  the  fifth  time  removed  the  court  — this  time  far 
away  from  the  troublesome  banks  of  the  Yellow  River  to 
a site  in  the  present  province  of  Chi-li.  A lengthy  account 
containing  speeches  in  which  he  places  on  record  his  views 
on  government  has  been  preserved  in  the  Shu-king.  One 
of  his  successors,  Wu-ting,  the  last  of  the  virtuous  rulers 
of  the  dynasty  (1324-1266  b.c.),  had  intrusted  himself  in 
all  government  affairs  to  his  aged  teacher  Kan-p’an,  who 
soon  had  to  retire  on  account  of  old  age.  The  emperor 
now  sought  a clever  man  to  assist  him  in  his  duties,  for 

* Chavannes,  op.  cit.,  vol.  i,  Introduction,  p.  cxci.  ^ The  details 
of  the  two  systems  of  chronology  have  been  placed  together  in 
Arcndt’s  Synchronistische  Regententabellen. 


THE  SHANG,  OR  YIN,  DYNASTY  (1766-1122  b.c.)  53 


which  purpose  he  addressed  himself  to  Shang-ti,  the  Supreme 
Ruler,  that  is,  God,  asking  that  He  would  reveal  to  him  in 
a dream  the  man  who  should  act  as  his  prime  minister. 
He  dreamed  the  dream  and  saw  his  future  counselor,  but 
he  could  not  find  his  like  among  the  grandees  of  the  empire, 
though  he  searched  the  country  over.  Finally  he  proved 
to  be  a common  workman  by  the  name  of  Fu-yiie,  who  not 
only  resembled  the  portrait  shown  him  by  God  in  his 
dream,  but  in  the  sequel  showed  his  possession  of  all  the 
requisite  qualities  for  the  high  position  to  which  he  was 
forthwith  raised.  Indeed  he  became  a worthy  successor 
to  the  great  I Yin,  the  assistant  of  Ch’ong-t’ang,  the 
founder  of  the  dynasty.  A glorious  and  peaceful  govern- 
ment resulted  from  the  perfectly  harmonious  manner  in 
which  Wu-ting  and  his  minister  worked  together. 

Not  much  need  be  said  about  their  successors,  rulers  as 
well  as  ministers,  down  to  Chou-sin,  the  last  ruler  of  the 
dynasty,  on  whose  unworthy  head  all  the  crimes  of  an 
incompetent  and  vicious  monarch  have  been  heaped  by 
the  historians  of  later  ages.  His  history  is  almost  a parallel 
to  that  of  Kie,  the  unworthy  last  emperor  of  the  Hia 
dynasty. 

I quote  the  Bamboo  Books  in  Legge’s  translation,'  in 
order  to  show  what  this  venerable  record  is  like. 

§ 18.  Chou-sin  (1154-1122  b.c.) 

“In  his  first  year,  which  was  ki-hai  (thirty-sixth  of  the  cycle 
= 1102  B.C.),  when  he  came  to  the  throne,  Chou-sin  dwelt  in  Yin. 
He  gave  appointments  to  the  princes  of  K’iu,  Chou,  and  Yii. 

“In  his  third  year,  a sparrow  produced  a hawk.  In  his  fourth 
year,  he  had  a great  hunting  in  Li.  He  invented  the  punishment  of 
roasting.  In  his  fifth  year,  in  the  summer,  he  built  the  tower  of 
* Shu-king,  Prolegomena,  p.  139  seqq. 


54 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


Nan-tan.  There  was  a shower  of  earth  in  Po.  In  his  sixth  year, 
the  chief  of  the  west  [Si-po,  i.e.  Won-wang]  offered  sacrifice  for  the 
first  time  to  his  ancestors  in  Pi.  In  his  ninth  year,  the  royal  forces 
attacked  the  State  of  Su,  and  brought  away  Ta-ki  as  a captive. 
The  king  made  an  apartment  for  her,  with  walls  of  carnation  stone, 
and  the  doors  all  adorned  with  gems.  In  his  tenth  year,  in  the 
summer,  in  the  sixth  month,  he  hunted  in  the  western  borders. 
In  his  seventeenth  year,  the  chief  of  the  west  smote  the  Ti.  In  the 
winter,  the  king  made  a pleasure  excursion  in  K’i.  In  his  twenty- 
first  year,  in  the  spring,  in  the  first  month,  the  princes  went  to  Chou 
to  do  homage.  Po-i  and  Shu-ts’i  betook  themselves  to  Chou  from 
Ku-chu.  In  his  twenty-second  year,  in  the  winter,  he  had  a great 
hunting  along  the  Wei.  In  his  twenty-third  year,  he  imprisoned 
the  chief  of  the  west  in  Yu-li.  In  his  twenty-ninth  year,  he  liber- 
ated the  chief  of  the  west,  who  was  met  by  many  of  the  princes  and 
escorted  back  to  Ch’ong.  In  his  thirtieth  year,  in  the  spring,  in  the 
third  month,  the  chief  of  the  west  led  the  princes  to  the  court  with 
their  tributes.  In  his  thirty-first  year,  the  chief  of  the  west  began 
to  form  a regular  army  in  Pi,  with  Lii  Shang  as  its  commander.  In 
his  thirty-second  year,  there  was  a conjunction  of  the  five  planets 
in  Fang.  A red  crow  lighted  on  the  altar  to  the  spirits  of  the  land 
in  Chou.  The  people  of  Mi  invaded  Yuan,  when  the  chief  of  the 
west  led  a force  against  Mi.  In  his  thirty-third  year,  the  people 
of  Mi  surrendered  to  the  army  of  Chou,  and  were  removed  to  Ch’ong. 
The  king  granted  power  to  the  chief  of  the  west  to  punish  and  attack 
offending  states  on  his  own  discretion. 

“In  his  thirty-fourth  year,  the  forces  of  Chou  took  K’i  and  Yii; 
and  then  attacked  Ts’ung,  which  surrendered.  In  the  winter,  in 
the  twelfth  month,  the  hordes  of  Kun  overran  Chou.  In  the 
thirty-fifth  year,  there  was  a great  famine  in  Chou;  when  the 
chief  of  the  west  removed  from  Ch’ong  to  Fung.  In  his  thirty- 
sixth  year,  in  the  spring,  in  the  first  month,  the  princes  went  to 
court  at  Chou,  and  then  they  smote  the  hordes  of  Kun.  The  chief 
of  the  west  made  his  heir-son  Fa  [i.e.  Wu-wang]  build  Hau.  In  his 
thirty-seventh  year,  the  Duke  of  Chou  built  an  imperial  college. 
In  his  thirty-ninth  year,  the  great  officer  Sin-kia  fled  to  Chou.  In 
his  fortieth  year,  the  Duke  of  Chou  made  the  spirit-tower.  The 
king  sent  Kiau-ko  to  seek  for  gems  in  Chou.  In  his  forty-first  year. 


THE  SHANG,  OR  YIN,  DYNASTY  (1766-1122  b.c.)  55 


in  the  spring,  in  the  third  month,  Ch’ang,  the  chief  of  the  west,  died. 
In  his  forty-second  year.  Fa,  the  chief  of  the  west,  received  the 
vermilion  book  from  Lii  Shang.  A girl  changed  into  a man.  In 
his  forty-third  year,  in  the  spring,  he  had  a grand  review.  Part  of 
Mount  Yau  fell  down.  In  his  forty-fourth  year.  Fa  smote  Li.  In 
his  forty-seventh  year,  the  recorder  of  the  Interior,  Hiang  Chi,  fled 
to  Chou.  In  his  forty-eighth  year  the  I goat  was  seen.  Two  suns 
appeared  together.  In  his  fifty-first  year,  in  the  winter,  in  the 
eleventh  month,  on  the  day  mou-tzi  (twenty-fifth  of  the  cycle),  the 
army  of  Ch6u  crossed  the  ford  of  Mong,  but  returned.  The  king 
imprisoned  the  Viscount  of  K’i,  and  put  his  relative  Pi-kan  to  death ; 
while  the  Viscount  of  Wei  fled  away.  In  his  fifty-second  year, 
which  was  kong-yin  (twenty-seventh  of  the  cycle),  Chou  made  its 
first  attack  on  Yin.  In  the  autumn,  the  army  of  Chou  camped  in 
the  plain  of  Si4n.  In  the  winter,  in  the  twelfth  month,  it  sacrificed 
to  God.  The  tribes  of  Yung,  Shu,  Kiang,  Mau,  Wei,  Lu,  P’ong, 
and  Pu,  followed  Chou  to  the  attack  of  Yin.” 

Some  explanations  will  be  necessary  for  the  modern 
student  to  understand  this  terse  account,  apart  from  the 
several  geographical  and  personal  names,  to  comment  on 
which  it  would  take  us  too  far  afield. 

I fully  concur  with  the  opinion  expressed  by  Chavannes,‘ 
who  says  with  regard  to  the  trustworthiness  of  Chinese 
history  down  to  this  period,  that  the  legends  recorded  in 
connection  with  the  model  emperors  Yau  and  Shun  appear 
to  be  built  up  on  a symmetrical  system  provoking  suspicion ; 
that  neither  of  them  is  mentioned  in  the  most  ancient  Con- 
fucian  classic,  the  Ski-king,  and  that  most  of  the  details  of 
their  history  betray  the  manners  and  political  organization 
of  the  Ch6u  dynasty.  Chavannes ' says : — 

“As  regards  the  Emperor  Yii,  he  is  credited  with  having 
performed  hydrographic  works  which  would  have  claimed  the 
continuous  efforts  of  several  generations.  In  the  book  of  the  Shu- 
* Les  memoires  historiques,  vol.  i,  Introduction,  p.  cxI. 


56 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


king,  called  ‘Tribute  of  Yii,’  we  may  distinguish  an  ancient  geogra- 
phy with  which  the  legend  of  this  sovereign  has  been  mixed  up  by 
way  of  superfoetation.  Yau,  Shun  and  Yii,  these  three  august 
mythological  phantoms,  have  no  longer  any  reality,  if  one  seeks  to 
seize  them  bodily.  The  veritable  facts  do  not  appear  before  the 
Chou  dynasty  and  the  prince  deposed  by  it,  the  perverse  Chou-sin, 
who  became  guilty  of  excessive  love  towards  the  beautiful  and 
cruel  Ta-ki.  It  is,  therefore,  not  until  almost  the  end  of  the  twelfth 
century  b.c.  that  we  find  the  hitherto  uncertain  ground  on  which 
the  historian  has  guided  us  so  far  become  firm  enough  to  walk  upon.” 

Ch6u-sin  united  in  his  person  all  that  is  bad  in  an  em- 
peror. If  Yau  and  Shun  may  be  called  the  model  emperors 
par  excellence,  he  was  the  very  reverse.  Ssi-ma  Ts’ien ' 
characterizes  him  in  a few  words  as  follows : — 

“The  Emperor  Chou  was  of  quick  discernment,  gifted  with  sharp 
senses,  mental  ability  beyond  the  ordinary,  and  physical  strength 
of  brutal  power.  Knowledge  enabled  him  to  keep  remonstrance  at 
a distance ; eloquence  enabled  him  to  gloss  his  vicious  acts.  Boast- 
ing to  his  subjects  of  his  ability,  and  exalting  his  empire  by  clamor- 
ing, was  to  him  the  means  to  make  himself  prominent.  He  loved 
the  pleasures  of  the  cup  and  debauchery,  and  was  infatuated  with 
his  consort,  the  beloved  Ta-ki,  whose  words  he  obeyed.” 

From  what  the  historian  places  on  record  in  connection 
with  this  couple,  it  appears  that  Madam  Ta-ki  was  an  early 
prototype  of  that  perverse  mentality  presented  in  the  eigh- 
teenth centiu^y  by  that  ill-famed  maniac,  the  Marquis  de 
Sade. 

Legge*  recapitulates  what  the  commentators  of  the 
Shu-king  have  to  say  about  her  crimes  as  follows : — 

“ Ta-ki  was  shamelessly  lustful  and  cruel.  The  most  licentious 
songs  were  composed  for  her  amusement,  and  the  vilest  dances 
exhibited.  The  court  was  at  a place  in  the  present  district  of  Kfi, 

* Shi-ki,  ch.  iii,  p.  10;  cf.  Chavannes,  op.  cit.,  vol.  i,  p.  199.  * Shu- 
king,  p.  269  seq. 


THE  SHANG,  OR  YIN,  DYNASTY  (1766-1122  b.c.)  57 


dep.  of  Wei-hui,  and  there  a palace  was  erected  for  her,  with  a 
famous  terrace  or  tower,  two  li  wide,  and  the  park  around  stocked 
with  the  rarest  animals.  This  expenditure  necessitated  heavy- 
exactions,  which  moved  the  resentment  of  the  people.  At  Sha-k’iu, 
in  the  present  district  of  P’ing-hiang,  in  Chi-li,  there  was  still  greater 
extravagance  and  dissipation.  There  was  a pond  of  wine,  the 
trees  were  hung  with  flesh ; men  and  women  chased  each  other  about 
quite  naked.  In  the  palace  there  were  nine  market  stances,  where 
they  drank  all  night.  The  princes  began  to  rebel,  when  Ta-ki  said 
that  the  majesty  of  the  throne  was  not  sufficiently  maintained ; 
that  punishments  were  too  light,  and  executions  too  rare.  She, 
therefore,  devised  two  new  instruments  of  torture.  One  of  them 
was  called  ‘The  Heater,’  and  consisted  of  a piece  of  metal  made 
hot  in  a fire,  which  people  were  obliged  to  take  up  in  their  hands. 
The  other  was  a copper  pillar,  greased  all  over,  and  laid  above  a 
pit  of  live  charcoal.  The  culprit  had  to  walk  across  the  pillar, 
and  when  his  feet  slipped  and  he  fell  down  into  the  fire,  Ta-ki  was 
greatly  delighted.  This  was  called  the  punishment  of  ‘Roasting.’ 
These  enormities  made  the  whole  empire  groan  and  fume  with 
indignation.”  ‘ 


§ 19.  Won- WANG,  Duke  of  Chou  (1182-1135  b.c.) 

Such  a state  of  things  could  not,  of  course,  last  long,  and 
the  reaction,  bound  to  follow  such  misgovernment,  soon 
set  in.  Among  the  feudal  states  of  the  empire  was  that  of 
Chou,  distinguished  by  its  virtuous  ruler  Ch’ang,  known  also 
by  the  name  Si-po,  “Chief  of  the  West,”  and  well  known 
in  Chinese  literature  as  Won-wang,  the  father  of  Wu-wang, 
the  first  ruler  of  the  Chou  dynasty.  He  had  followed  his 
father  on  the  throne  of  his  duchy  in  1182  b.c.  His  grand- 
father T’an-fu,  known  in  literature  as  Ku-kung,  “ the  Old 

* From  the  chronology  of  the  Bamboo  Books  it  would  appear  that 
the  “ punishment  of  Roasting,”  was  invented  by  Ch6u-sin  five  years 
before  he  brought  away  Ta-ki  as  a captive. 


58 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


Duke,”  or  T’ai-wang  (King  T’ai),  the  prince  of  a little  state 
called  Pin,  near  the  present  Si-an-fu,  had  since  1327  b.c. 
changed  the  name  of  his  little  duchy  into  that  of  Chou. 
As  Duke  of  Chou  he  was  followed  by  his  son  Ki-li  in  1231 
B.C.,  the  very  year  in  which  Ki-li’s  son  Ch’ang  (Won-wang) 
was  born.  Ki-li  had  been,  through  several  generations 
of  emperors,  the  most  influential  personage  of  the  em- 
pire, being  employed  as  prime  minister  and  at  times  as 
commander-in-chief  to  fight  rebels  and  other  enemies; 
and  when  Won-wang  succeeded  him,  it  appears  the  condi- 
tions of  the  role  the  great  Wu-wang’s  house  was  destined 
to  play  in  the  history  of  China  sixty  years  later  on  were 
given. 

Won-wang  began  his  career  by  devoting  himself  entirely 
to  the  administration  of  his  state,  which  henceforth  he 
changed  into  a model  of  good  government.  Chinese 
literature  abounds  with  records  of  his  doings ; and  all  au- 
thorities agree  in  the  praise  of  his  virtue  and  wisdom.  His 
consort  gave  birth  to  ten  sons.  Of  these  the  eldest  died 
yoimg;  the  second,  Wu-wang,  whose  proper  name  was 
Fa,  later  on  became  the  founder  of  the  Chou  dynasty;  his 
fourth  son  Tan,  well  known  as  Chou-kung,  or  Duke  of 
Chou,  became  Wu-wang’s  famous  assistant  in  consolidating 
the  empire.  Wbn-wang’s  uprightness  of  character  was 
bound  to  bring  him  sooner  or  later  into  conflict  with  the 
tyrant  emperor  Chou-sin.  He  and  two  other  grandees  of 
the  empire  had  been  raised  to  the  dignity  of  dukes,  although 
none  of  them  approved  the  vicious  government  of  their 
chief.  Two  friends  and  colleagues  of  Won-wang’s  had 
made  an  attempt  to  cure  the  emperor  of  his  infatuation 
for  Ta-ki,  for  w'hich  they  were  condemned  to  death.  The 
body  of  one  of  them  was  cut  into  pieces,  cooked,  and  served 


THE  SHANG,  OR  YIN,  DYNASTY  (1766-1122  b.c.)  59 


as  a dish  of  meat  to  the  father  of  the  victim,  who  also  was 
subsequently  killed.  Won-wang  freely  gave  vent  to  his 
indignation  at  these  horrors,  whereupon  one  of  the  emperor’s 
creatures,  the  Marquis  of  Ch’ung,  denounced  him  for  the 
crime  of  lese-majesty;  but  Won-wang’s  reputation  through- 
out the  empire  for  unimpeachableness  of  character  gave 
him  an  authority  which  even  the  emperor  respected,  and 
Chou-sin  dared  not  take  his  life  lest  the  people  should  rise 
in  indignation;  he,  therefore,  confined  himself  to  making 
the  duke  a prisoner  at  Yu-li,  in  the  modern  Honan.  There 
Won-wang  spent  three  years,  making  use  of  his  seclusion 
in  producing  one  of  the  most  famous  works  of  Chinese 
literature,  the  I-king,  “Book  of  Changes.”  Next  to  cer- 
tain ballads  of  the  Shi-king,  “Book  of  Odes,”  and  apart 
from  the  hieroglyphic  inscriptions  of  the  Shang,  this  is 
one  of  the  oldest  products  of  Chinese  literature  now  in 
existence.^ 

As  we  have  already  seen,  the  invention  of  the  so-called 
Pa-km,  “Eight  kua,”  or  mystic  trigraphs  of  Chinese  super- 
stition (I  have  no  better  name  for  them),  is  ascribed  to  the 
Emperor  Fu-hi.  This  means  that  historians  are  unable 
to  name  an  inventor  for  them  within  the  historical  period. 
The  eight  trigraphs,  or  Kua,  consisted  of  a combination  of 
continuous  and  broken  lines,  each  corresponding  to  cer- 
tain elements  of  nature.  The  continuous  lines  represent 
the  male,  the  broken  lines  the  female,  principle.  Every- 
thing good  and  superior,  according  to  Chinese  ideas,  is 
male;  the  opposite  is  female.  The  female  clearly  takes 

* Its  rival,  as  regards  antiquity,  is  possibly  the  very  short  text 
known  as  Yii-tzi,  “The  Philosopher  Yii,”  ascribed  with  some  uncer- 
tainty to  Yu  Hiung,  Won-wang’s  own  teacher.  Wylie,  Notes  on 
Chinese  Literature,  p.  125. 


60 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


a back  seat  in  nature.  Heaven  is  male,  earth  is  female; 
the  sun  is  male,  the  moon  is  female.  Similarly,  the  ideas 
of  “day,”  “south,”  “white,”  as  positive  terms,  are  male, 
while  their  opposites  “night,”  “north,”  and  “black”  are 
female.  If  the  inventor  of  these  mystic  combinations, 
which  in  the  last  instance  fall  back  on  the  most  ancient 
Chinese  division  of  natural  phenomena  into  male  and 
female,  was  aware  that  he  was  dispensing  all  the  good 
things  to  man,  leaving  his  fair  companion  in  the  cold,  the 
eight  kua  could  not  have  originated  at  a time  when  matri- 
archy was  the  order  of  the  day,  as  ought  to  have  been  the 
case  before  Fu-hi,  the  inventor  of  matrimony,  before  whose 
time,  we  are  told,  “children  knew  only  their  mothers  and 
not  their  fathers.”  This  unmistakable  allusion  to  matri- 
archy occurs  in  the  Pai-hu-t' ung , a work  published  by  the 
celebrated  historian  Pan  Ku,  who  died  92  a.d.  The  coin- 
cidence of  matriarchy  being  abandoned  for  matrimony, 
headed  by  a pater  familias,  which  involves  the  ascendency 
of  the  male  to  rulership  in  the  family,  and  the  invention  of  a 
system  of  symbols  associating  all  the  sympathetic  phe- 
nomena of  nature  with  the  male,  leaving  their  cold  and 
unsympathetic  opposites  to  the  female,  impresses  me  as 
another  instance  of  logical  reasoning  among  the  historians 
responsible  for  these  details  in  their  imaginary  history  of 
primeval  man. 

Tlie  eight  trigrams  of  Fu-hi  were  the  following : — 

1st  K’ien,  heaven,  the  ethereal  principle;  the 

symbol  consisting  of  three  male  lines. 

2d  = = K’un,  earth;  three  female  lines. 

3d  — = Chon,  thunder;  two  female  lines  above  one 
male. 


THE  SHANG,  OR  YIN,  DYNASTY  (1766-1122  b.c.)  61 


4th  — Kon,  mountain  and  hills;  two  female  lines 
below  one  male. 


5th 

6th  ZZ  IZ- 
7th 

8th 


Li,  fire,  light,  heat;  one  female  between  two 
male  lines. 

K’an,  water,  liquid  element;  one  male  be- 
tween two  female  lines. 

Tui,  steam ; one  female  above  two  male  lines. 
Sun,  wind;  one  female  below  two  male  lines. 


It  will  be  seen  that  all  these  symbols  constitute  a com- 
bination of  broken  and  unbroken  lines;  the  latter  stand  for 
male,  or  yang ; the  former  for  female,  or  yin.  The  pre- 
ponderance and  relative  position  of  the  one  or  the  other  of 
the  two  principles  of  gender  produce  the  idea  of  certain 
elements  of  nature.  Won-wang  is  supposed  to  have  per- 
fected this  system  by  doubling  the  number  of  strokes,  thus 
obtaining  sixty-four  combinations,  to  each  of  which  he 
attached  a number  of  symbolic  meanings.  He  described 
this  system  in  the  I-king,  which  is  regarded  by  the  Chinese 
themselves  as  the  chief  classic  of  their  literature.  In  their 
opinion  it  forms  the  essence  of  all  wisdom.  Its  occultness, 
however,  makes  it  unintelligible  to  any  student  not  willing 
to  devote  all  his  energies  to  its  interpretation.  The  I-king, 
which  during  recent  years  has  attracted  the  attention  of 
Sinologues,  is  important  not  only  from  any  value  modern 
scholars  may  attach  to  it,  but  also  from  the  close  connec- 
tion, mysterious  though  it  may  appear  to  us,  in  which  it  has 
stood  for  three  thousand  years  with  the  entire  mental  and 
social  life  of  the  Chinese.  The  native  literature  in  the  shape 
of  commentaries  on  Won-wang’s  work  is  enormous.  As  a 
book  containing  what  the  Chinese  would  call  the  principles 
of  their  science  of  divination,  the  I-king  has,  in  spite  of  its 


62 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


imintelligibility,  permeated  the  masses  more  deeply  per- 
haps than  the  writings  of  Confucius.  Confucius  himself 
spoke  of  the  work  in  the  highest  terms ; and  this  could  not 
but  act  as  a recommendation  to  all  the  philosophers  of  his 
school. 

Won-wang’s  son  Fa,  who  later  on  became  the  founder  of 
the  Chou  dynasty  under  the  name  of  Wu-wang,  was  anxious 
to  see  his  aged  father  delivered  from  his  confinement,  and 
since  he  did  not  see  his  way  to  bring  this  about  by  either 
persuasion  or  force,  he  took  refuge  in  the  emperor’s  weak- 
ness for  female  beauty.  He  made  him  a gift  of  a beautiful 
young  woman,  who  availed  herself  of  the  tyrant’s  tem- 
porary infatuation  in  demanding  Won-wang’s  release. 
Won-wang  was  reinstated  in  all  his  former  dignities  and 
declared  the  first  prince  of  the  court.  This  included  the 
privilege  of  surrounding  himself  with  an  armed  retinue. 
Won-wang  soon  left  the  court  and  returned  to  his  duchy. 
There  he  gathered  around  him  the  discontented  elements 
among  the  emperor’s  grandees  and,  by  making  war  on 
some  of  the  neighboring  states  which  the  emperor  had 
asked  him  to  subdue,  increased  his  military  power.  Hav- 
ing changed  his  capital  twice  and  spent  several  years  in 
warfare,  he  died  in  1135  b.c.  at  the  age  of  ninety,  after  a 
glorious  reign  of  half  a century. 


§ 20.  Wu-WANG  AND  THE  FaLL  OP  THE  ShANG  DyNASTY 

Won-wang’s  government  had  so  much  strengthened  the 
power  of  his  duchy,  and  his  grand  reputation  as  a ruler 
with  the  emperor’s  misgovernment  had  made  him  so  many 
friends,  that  his  son  Wu-wang  soon  found  himself  at  the 
head  of  a revolutionary  party  destined  to  make  an  end  of 


THE  SHANG,  OR  YIN,  DYNASTY  (1766-1122  b.c.)  63 


the  abhorred  dynasty  of  Shang.  New,  unheard-of  cruelties 
committed  by  Chou-sin  and  his  consort  Ta-ki  helped  to 
kindle  the  fire  of  sedition.  The  remonstrances  and  ex- 
hortations of  the  well-disposed  among  the  emperor’s 
entourage  were  of  no  avail.  One  of  his  own  relatives, 
named  Pi  Kan,  who  had  dared  to  reproach  him  for  his 
depravity,  became  one  of  the  last  victims  of  his  cruelty. 
In  reply  to  a long  speech  he  had  made  before  the  emperor, 
the  latter  cried  out:  “They  say  a sage  has  seven  orifices 
in  his  heart.  Let  us  see  if  this  is  the  case  with  you.” 
Upon  which  he  caused  Pi  Kan  to  be  disembowelled  in  his 
presence. 

Another  kinsman  of  the  emperor’s,  the  Viscount  of  Wei, 
left  court  to  place  himself  under  Wu-wang’s  protection, 
who  at  last  assembled  his  forces  to  take  in  hand  the  punish- 
ment of  the  tyrant.  Before  crossing  the  Yellow  River, 
at  a place  called  Mong-tsin,  he  made  some  celebrated 
speeches  to  his  adherents,  in  which  he  explains  the  motives 
of  his  action,  the  supposed  tenor  of  which  has  been  pre- 
served in  the  Shu-king}  Wu-wang  there  says:  — 

“Heaven  and  earth  is  the  parent  of  all  creatures;  and  of  all 
creatures  man  is  the  most  highly  endowed.  The  sincere,  intelligent, 
and  perspicacious  among  men  becomes  the  great  sovereign;  and 
the  great  sovereign  is  the  parent  of  the  people.  But  now  Chou-sin, 
the  king  of  Shang,  does  not  reverence  Heaven  above,  and  inflicts 
calamities  on  the  people  below.  He  has  been  abandoned  to  drunk- 
enness, and  reckless  in  lust.  He  has  dared  to  exercise  cruel  oppres- 
sion. Along  with  criminals  he  has  punished  all  their  relatives. 
He  has  put  men  into  office  on  the  hereditary  principle.  He  has 
made  it  his  pursuit  to  have  palaces,  towers,  pavilions,  embank- 
ments, ponds,  and  all  other  extravagances,  to  the  most  painful 
injury  of  you,  the  myriad  people.  He  has  burned  and  roasted  the 


' Legge,  p.  281  seqq. 


64 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


loyal  and  good.  He  has  ripped  up  pregnant  women.  Great  Heaven 
was  moved  with  indignation,  and  charged  my  deceased  father 
Won-wang  reverently  to  display  its  majesty;  but  he  died  before 
the  work  was  completed. 

“On  this  account,  I,  Fa  [Wu-wang],  who  am  but  a little  child, 
have  by  means  of  you,  the  hereditary  rulers  of  my  friendly  states, 
contemplated  the  government  of  Shang;  but  Chou-sin  has  no 
repentant  heart.  He  abides  squatting  on  his  heels,  not  serving 
God  or  the  spirits  of  heaven  and  earth,  neglecting  also  the  temple 
of  his  ancestors,  and  not  sacrificing  in  it.  The  victims  and  the 
vessels  of  millet  all  become  the  prey  of  wicked  robbers;  and  still 
he  says,  ‘The  people  are  mine;  the  decree  is  mine,’  never  trying  to 
correct  his  contemptuous  mind.  Now  Heaven,  to  protect  the 
inferior  people,  made  for  them  rulers,  and  made  for  them  instruc- 
tors, that  they  might  be  able  to  be  aiding  to  God,  and  secure  the 
tranquillity  of  the  four  quarters  of  the  empire.  In  regard  to  who 
are  criminals  and  who  are  not,  how  dare  I give  any  allowance  to 
my  own  wishes?  Where  the  strength  is  the  same,  measure  the 
virtue  of  the  parties;  where  the  virtue  is  the  same,  measure  their 
righteousness.  Chou-sin  has  hundreds  of  thousands  and  myriads 
of  ministers,  but  they  have  hundreds  of  thousands  and  myriads  of 
minds ; I have  three  thousand  ministers,  but  they  have  one  mind. 
The  iniquity  of  Shang  is  full.  Heaven  gives  command  to  destroy 
it.  If  I did  not  comply  with  Heaven  my  iniquity  would  be  as 
great. 

“I,  who  am  a little  child,  early  and  late  am  filled  with  appre- 
hensions. I have  received  charge  from  my  deceased  father  Won- 
wang;  I have  offered  special  sacrifice  to  God;  I have  performed 
the  due  services  to  the  great  Earth  — and  I lead  the  multitude  of 
you  to  execute  the  punishment  appointed  by  Heaven.  Heaven 
compassionates  the  people.  What  the  people  desire.  Heaven  will 
be  found  to  give  effect  to.  Do  you  aid  me,  the  one  man,  to  cleanse 
for  ever  all  within  the  four  seas.  Now  is  the  time  ! It  may  not  be 
lost.” 

With  similar  speeches  Wu-wang  addressed  the  leaders 
and  soldiers  of  his  army  and  his  allies,  who  had  “ come  from 
afar,  being  men  of  the  Western  regions.”  This  may  pos- 


THE  SHANG,  OR  YIX,  DYNASTY  (1766-1122  b.c.)  65 


sibly  imply  that  he  relied  on  the  help  of  the  Huns,  his 
neighbors  in  the  West.  He  certainly  mentions  a number 
of  ethnic  names  belonging  to  non-Chinese  tribes.  “Lift 
up  your  lances,  join  your  shields,  raise  your  spears.” 
“Chou,  the  king  of  Shang,  follows  only  the  words  of  his 
wife.”  “They  are  only  the  vagabonds  of  the  empire, 
loaded  with  crimes,  whom  he  honors  and  exalts,  whom  he 
employs  and  trusts,  making  them  great  officers  and  nobles, 
so  that  they  can  tyrannize  over  the  people,  exercising  their 
villainies  in  the  city  of  Shang.” 

On  having  made  a goodly  number  of  speeches,  which  are 
preserved  in  the  Shu-king,  Wu-wang  gave  battle  to  the 
assembled  army  of  the  emperor.  After  a bloody  fight  the 
latter  was  completely  defeated.  Chou-sin  took  refuge  in 
his  palace,  where  he  ordered  all  his  most  valuable  jewels 
to  be  brought,  and  set  fire  to  the  building,  in  order  not  to 
fall  into  the  hands  of  the  enemy.  \Mien  the  news  of 
Chou-sin’s  death  was  brought  to  Wu-wang,  he  entered 
Chou-sin’s  palace  to  convince  himself  of  the  fact.  Ssi'-ma 
Ts’ien  informs  us  that  Wu-wang  shot  three  arrows  at  the 
emperor’s  corpse,  descended  from  his  car,  and  stabbed  it 
with  his  dagger,  after  which  he  severed  the  head  from  the 
body  and  suspended  it  from  a white  standard.  Madam 
Ta-ki  and  another  favorite  of  the  emperor  were  killed,  and 
their  corpses  were  similarly  treated. 

The  word  used  by  Ssi-ma  Ts’ien  for  the  dagger  with 
which  Wu-wang  stabbed  the  dead  emperor  is  king-kien, 
which  means  a “light  two-edged  sword.”  But  this  is 
clearly  not  the  original  reading.  The  latter  is  preserved 
in  the  Chdu-shu,  a work  which  Chavannes  ^ has  good 
reason  to  believe  to  be  older  than  the  Sh'i-ki.  In  the  cor- 
* Les  memoires  historiques,  vol.  i,  p.  235,  note  1,  and  vol.  v,  p.  457. 


66 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


responding  passage  of  the  Chdu-shu,  which  appears  with 
but  slight  alterations  in  Ssi-ma  Ts’ien’s  text,  the  word 
used  for  Wu-wang’s  dagger  is  king-liX  {king  = “light,”  lu  = 
“a  musical  pipe”).  Tlie  two  characters  employed  in 
describing  this  sound  give  absolutely  no  sense  in  ordinary 
Chinese,  and  the  commentators  found  it  necessary  to  add 
that  the  term  represents  the  “name  of  a double-edged 
sword,”  or  “a  dagger”  {kien-ming).  Ssi-ma  Ts’ien,  or  per- 
haps some  later  editor  of  his  text,  who  did  not  understand 
the  word,  substituted  king-kien,  “light  double-edged 
sword.”  But  the  word  is  easily  explained  if  we  look  upon 
it  as  a foreign  term.  We  receive  a broad  hint  as  to  its 
origin  in  the  account  of  a historical  event  preserved  in  the 
history  of  the  earlier  Han  dynasty. ‘ When,  in  47  n.c., 
the  chief  of  the  Hiung-nu,  or  Huns,  was  about  to  conclude 
a treaty  with  the  Chinese  court,  the  ceremony  of  swearing 
a solemn  oath  had  to  be  gone  through,  in  which  the  Great 
Khan,  or  Shan-yu,  had  to  swallow  a beverage  prepared  by 
himself  and  consisting  of  the  blood  of  a white  horse  mixed 
with  wine.  The  khan  stirred  the  wine  with  a king-luk  and 
a golden  cyathus,  and  the  scholiast  explains  the  term  king- 
ink  as  “the  precious  sword  of  the  Hiung-nu.”  I have  for 
years,  in  the  course  of  my  readings  of  Chinese  texts  re- 
garding the  Turkish  nations  in  central  Asia,  tried  to  trace 
the  prototypes  of  Chinese  transcriptions  representing 
Turkish  words;  and  quite  a number  of  examples  seem  to 
suggest  that  the  language  used  by  the  ancient  Huns,  or 
Hiung-nu,  was  actually  Turkish,  as  has  been  suggested  by 
Klaproth  and  others.  The  word  corresponding  to  the 
Chinese  transcription  king-luk  may  be  easily  recognized 
in  a word  found  in  the  modern  Turki  language  and  some 
* Ts’ien-han-shu,  ch.  94  B,  p.  6. 


THE  SHANG,  OR  YIN,  DYNASTY  (1766-1122  b.c.)  67 


other  Turkish  dialects;  namely,  kingrak,  “a  two-edged 
knife,  a sabre.”  I do  not  hesitate  to  apply  this  identifica- 
tion to  the  word  used  for  Wu-wang’s  dagger,  king-lii,  which 
may  be  merely  another  transcription  for  the  purely  Turk- 
ish word  kingrak.  If  my  deductions  are  correct,  they 
would  indicate  that  a Turkish  name  was  in  use  for  a kind 
of  weapon  which  the  first  emperor  of  the  Chou  dynasty 
carried  with  him  in  the  twelfth  century  b.c.,  and  that  this 
is  the  oldest  Turkish  word  on  record.  But  it  seems  also  to 
suggest  that  Wu-wang,  whose  dominions  lay  on  the  western 
border  of  China,  stood  in  certain  relations  with  his  next- 
door  neighbors,  the  ancestors  of  the  Hiung-nu.  It  is 
highly  probable  that  the  barbarians  mentioned  in  connection 
with  certain  inroads  they  made  on  Chinese  territory  during 
the  remotest  periods  of  Chinese  history  are  identical  with 
the  well-known  hereditary  enemy  of  the  Chinese,  the 
Hiung-nu,  whose  history  begins  to  be  told  with  palpable 
detail  from  the  beginning  of  the  third  century  b.c. 

The  various  names  under  which  these  northern  and  west- 
ern neighbors  of  the  Chinese  are  mentioned  during  the 
earlier  periods  of  history  appear  to  be  variants  in  the 
transcription  of  the  same  name  Hun  or  Hunnu.  Thus  we 
find  the  Hun-yii  mentioned  as  a tribe  on  the  northern  bor- 
ders, against  whom  the  Emperor  Huang-ti  is  supposed  to 
have  made  war  in  the  twenty-seventh  century  b.c.  A later 
name  was  Hien-yiin,  the  designation  in  use  previous  to 
the  introduction  of  the  term  Hiung-nu  in  the  third  century 
B.c.  The  root  Hun  or  Kun  will  appear  to  those  gifted 
with  a lively  imagination  to  occur  in  various  other  names 
for  the  ancestors  of  King  Attila’s  people,  then  occupying 
the  northern  and  western  borders  of  China.  The  reason 
why  the  Chinese  compare  these  northern  nomads  and  other 


68 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


barbarous  tribes  to  “dogs”  (K’iian  or  K’un)  may  have 
originated  in  a kind  of  jeu  de  mot.  As  early  as  689  b.c. 
we  read  in  Tso’s  commentary  on  the  “Spring  and  Autumn 
Annals that  the  “dog  barbarians,”  in  Chinese  K’iian- 
jung,  were  defeated.  If  this  word  K’iian  (in  Cantonese 
K’un),  “dog,”  is  another  transcription  for  Hun  or  Hun, 
this  may  remind  us  of  the  popular  etymology  of  the  Ger- 
man abusive  term  Hundsfott,  which  has  been  wrongly 
explained  as  having  originated  in  the  words  Hunnus 
fuit.  One  of  these  tribes,  whom  Won-wang  is  supposed 
to  have  defeated  1138  b.c.,  was  called  Kuan,  Kun,  or  Hun, 
and  has  been  located  by  the  Chinese  historians  in  the  south 
of  the  present  Ordos  territory.  Mencius  praises  Won- 
wang  for  the  wisdom  with  which  he  “served”  the  Kun 
barbarians.  “It  requires  a perfectly  virtuous  prince,”  he 
says,^  “to  be  able  with  a great  country  to  serve  a small 
one,  as,  for  instance.  King  Won  served  the  Kun  barbarians. 
And  it  requires  a wise  prince  to  be  able  with  a small  coimtry 
to  serve  a large  one,  as  King  T’ai  [Won-wang’s  grand- 
father, 1327  B.C.]  served  the  Hiin-yii.”  Tlie  two  ethnic 
names  here  mentioned  probably  both  refer  to  the  Huns. 
How  Won-wang  served  his  neighbors,  the  Huns,  may  be 
seen  from  another  passage  in  Mencius,^  who  says : — 

“ Formerly,  when  King  T’ai  dwelt  in  Pin,  the  barbarians  of  the 
north  were  constantly  making  incursions  upon  it.  He  served  them 
with  skins  and  silks,  and  still  he  suffered  from  them.  He  served 
them  with  dogs  and  horses,  and  still  he  suffered  from  them.  He  served 
them  with  pearls  and  gems,  and  still  he  suffered  from  them.  See- 
ing this,  he  assembled Ahe  old  men, and  announced  to  them  saying: 
‘ What  the  barbarians  want  is  my  territory.  I have  heard  this  — 
that  a ruler  does  not  injure  his  people  with  that  wherewith  he 

‘ Legge,  Ch’un-ts’iu,  p.  126.  ^ Mencius,  ed.  Legge,  p.  31.  ’ Men- 
cius, ed.  Legge,  p.  52. 


THE  SHANG,  OR  YIN,  DYNASTY  (1766-1122  b.c.)  69 

/ 

nourishes  them.  My  children,  why  should  you  be  troubled  about 
having  no  prince?  I will  leave  this.’  Accordingly,  he  left  Pin, 
crossed  the  mountain  Liang,  built  a town  at  the  foot  of  Mount  K’i, 
and  dwelt  there.  The  people  of  Pin  said : ‘ He  is  a benevolent  man. 
We  must  not  lose  him.’  Those  who  followed  him  looked  like  crowds 
hastening  to  market.” 

We  learn  from  this  passage  that  T’ai-wang,  known  also 
as  Ku-kung,  whose  personal  name  was  T’an-fu,  the  grand- 
father of  Won-wang,  changed  his  residence  from  a place 
called  Pin  to  another  called  K’i,  and  that  the  move  was  due 
to  the  grinding  tribute  exacted  from  him  by  his  neighbors, 
the  Hiin-yu  (Hunnu),  or,  as  they  were  afterward  called 
by  the  Chinese,  Hiung-nu  tribes.  The  foundation  of  the 
duchy  of  Chou  is,  therefore,  closely  connected  with  this 
historical  fact,  placed  by  Chinese  standard  chronologists, 
whether  rightly  or  not,  in  the  year  1327  b.c.  I am  inclined 
to  believe  that  the  steady  growth  in  the  power  of  this 
house  of  Chou  was  due  to  two  main  causes : (1)  the  rotten- 
ness of  the  Chinese  government  under  Chou-sin,  who  lacked 
the  backbone  absolutely  essential  to  protect  the  nation 
against  the  common  enemy  that,  after  the  lapse  of  fifteen 
hundred  years,  was  to  become  fatal  to  powerful  Europe; 
(2)  the  exposed  position  of  the  dukes  of  Chou,  who  had  for 
generations  to  defend  their  distant  palatinate  against  the 
common  enemy,  while  the  responsible  head  of  the  nation 
roasted  his  subjects  to  please  his  favorite  Ta-ki.  But  for 
the  dukes  of  Chou,  China  would  have  then  become  a prey 
to  the  Huns.  In  one  of  his  speeches  to  the  assembled  army, 
preserved  in  the  Shu-king,^  Wu-wang  mentions  eight 
ethnic  names;  “0  ye  men  of  Yung,  Shu,  Kiang  Mau, 
Wei,  Lu,  P’ong  and  Po,  lift  up  your  lances,  join  your 


* Legge,  op.  cit.,  p.  301. 


70 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


shields,  raise  your  spears!  I have  a speech  to  make.” 
The  Chinese  commentators  hold  that  these  names  belong 
to  barbarian  tribes  living  outside  of  China  proper,  and 
insinuate  that  they  were  subject  to  the  dukes  of  Chou 
without  falling  under  the  dominions  of  the  emperor  of 
China.  Some  of  them  may  be  safely  located  in  the  south 
and  southwest  of  the  Chou  duchy;  others  are  stated  to 
have  occupied  the  western  and  northern  borders.  In  the 
Bamboo  Books  Wu-wang  is  represented  as  “assembling  the 
barbarians  of  the  West  (si-i)  and  the  princes  to  attack  Yin” 
(i.e.  Shang) ; ^ which  seems  to  imply  that  his  ascendency 
was  actually  brought  about  by  a foreign  army.  It  is, 
therefore,  quite  possible  that  a portion  of  Wu-wang’s  army 
was  formed  by  the  Kun  barbarians,  or  Huns,  of  the  Ordos 
territory,  his  nearest  neighbors,  defeated  and,  as  we  may 
assume,  incorporated  into  his  dominions  by  his  father 
Won-wang  in  1138  b.c. 

We  need  not  be  astonished  from  all  this  to  find  that 
Turkish  words,  like  the  one  for  Wu-wang’s  dagger,  have 
crept  into  the  Chinese  language,  which  is  as  much  mixed 
up  with  foreign  elements  as  is  Chinese  civilization  gen- 
erally. I wish  to  lay  stress  on  this  idea,  which,  it  appears 
to  me,  has  not  been  sufficiently  appreciated  by  the  his- 
torians, although  at  this  stage  we  can  but  faintly  trace  the 
foreign  influences  affecting  the  nation,  which  during  later 
centuries,  in  spite  of  the  well-known  conservative  character 
of  Chinese  culture,  have  assumed  such  dimensions  as  almost 
to  amount  to  amalgamation. 

> 

* Legge,  Shu-king,  Prolegomena,  p.  144. 


THE  SHANG,  OR  YIN,  DYNASTY  (1766-1122  b.c.)  71 


§ 21.  Culture  of  the  Shang  Period 

Before  leaving  the  Shang  dynasty,  which  may  be  de- 
scribed as  the  semi-historical  period  of  Chinese  history, 
a few  words  as  to  its  culture  will  be  in  place.  The  Shang 
and  Chou  dynasties  have  left  to  the  Far-eastern  world 
most  valuable  legacies  in  the  shape  of  monuments  of 
national  art,  chiefly  sacrificial  vessels  and  bells  made  of 
bronze  and  covered  with  characteristic  ornaments,  some- 
times also  with  hieroglyphic  inscriptions.  Under  the 
Emperor  Shi-huang-ti  works  of  literature  and  of  art  had 
a narrow  escape  from  being  consigned  to  oblivion,  owing 
to  the  persecution  of  this  enemy  of  all  ancient  civilization. 
Lovers  of  these  precious  monuments  of  antiquity  had  to 
bury,  immure,  or  conceal  them,  lest  they  might  be  dis- 
covered and  destroyed  under  a cruel  law.  Later  centuries 
rediscovered  them,  when  a period  of  renaissance  set  in, 
culminating  in  the  imperial  collections  of  the  T’ang  dy- 
nasty in  the  eighth,  and  again  in  the  twelfth,  century,  under 
the  great  imperial  collector  Hui-tsung,  and  finally  under 
K’i6n-lung  of  the  present  dynasty.  Chinese  archaeologists 
have  done  excellent  work  in  applying  a sound  method  of 
criticism  to  the  examination  of  such  works;  and  I am  per- 
sonally inclined  to  place  confidence  in  the  results  of  their 
researches.  Whether  an  ancient  bronze  vessel  is  1000, 
2000,  or  3000  years  old,  can  in  my  opinion  never  be  decided 
on  the  mere  appearance  of  its  surface.  Chemical  analysis 
might  throw  light  on  the  question;  but  I am  not  aware 
that  this  has  been  attempted.  In  deciding  whether  such 
vessels  date  from  the  Shang  dynasty,  Chinese  archseologists 
were  guided  by  the  style  of  ornament  — which  only  a trained 
eye  can  distinguish  from  that  of  the  succeeding  Chou  dy- 


72 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


nasty  — by  the  contents  and  style  of  the  legends  appearing 
on  them,  the  shape  of  the  hieroglyphics  used  therein,  and 
chiefly  by  the  names  of  persons  mentioned  in  them. 

Let  us  start  with  these  personal  names.  It  is  a character- 
istic of  the  Shang  period  that  personal  names  are  repre- 
sented by  cyclical  characters  such  as  /,  Ting,  Sin,  Kui, 
Kong,  and  Wu,  which  were  originally  used  as  calendar 
signs  to  denote  certain  days  of  the  month.  When  a child 
was  born,  it  received  the  name  of  the  day  on  which  the 
event  took  place.  This  custom  is  said  to  have  prevailed 
throughout  the  Shang  period  down  to  the  beginning  of  the 
Chou  dynasty.  In  examining  the  list  of  the  Shang  em- 
perors one  finds  that,  with  the  exception  of  Ch’ong-t’ang, 
the  founder  of  the  dynasty,  every  one  of  their  names  con- 
tains a personal  epithet,  like  T’ai  (“great”),  Siau  (“small, 
young”),  Tsu  (“ancestor”),  and  others,  followed  by  one 
of  these  cyclical  characters  denoting  the  birthday,  e.g. 
T’ai-kia,  Siau-sin,  and  Tsu-i,  being  names  of  Shang  em- 
perors, or  Fu-i  and  Tsu-mou,  which  are  found  among  the 
inscriptions  of  sacrificial  vessels.  With  other  words  the 
formation  of  names  becomes  typical  as  compared  with 
both  the  previous  legendary  period  and  the  succeeding 
Chou  epoch.  It  stands  to  reason  that  the  appearance  of 
a name  constructed  on  this  principle  caused  the  medieval 
art  critics  to  infer  that  works  thus  marked  dated  from  the 
Shang  period.  This  has  led  them  to  the  study  of  other 
characteristics  — the  shape  of  the  hieroglyphics  used,  the 
style  of  ornament,  class  of  vessel  in  connection  with  its 
sacrificial  use,  etc. 

The  study  of  these  ancient  bronzes  began  to  be  taken  up 
from  a critical  point  of  view  in  the  tenth  century  a.d., 
when,  under  the  title  K’au-ku-t’u,  an  illustrated  work  was 


THE  SHANG,  OR  YIN,  DYNASTY  (1766-1122  b.c.)  73 


published  with  the  cooperation  of  the  celebrated  painter 
Li  Lung-mien,  known  in  Japan  as  Ririumin,  himself  a 
great  collector  of  antiquities,  by  whom  some  of  the  illus- 
trations showing  the  shapes  and  ornaments  of  ancient 
bronzes  were  drawn.  The  compiler  of  the  book  had  to 
collect  his  material  from  manifold  sources,  since  at  that 
time  only  a small  number  of  the  vessels  described  was 
found  in  state  collections,  the  remainder  being  in  the  hands 
of  thirty-seven  private  collectors  living  in  several  parts  of 
the  empire,  but  chiefly  in  the  capital  Ch’ang-an,  the  present 
Si-an-fu.  Within  less  than  a century  a considerable  change 
took  place.  The  great  catalogue  of  the  collections  of  the 
Emperor  Hui-tsung,  comprising  the  art  treasures  formerly 
in  private  hands,  besides  a great  many  new  additions,  was 
prepared  and  published  under  the  name  Po-ku-t'u-lu  in 
thirty  books  during  the  years  1107-1111.  Its  author, 
Wang  Fu,  was  an  eminent  archaeologist;  and  the  Emperor 
Hui-tsung  (1101-1126),  insignificant  though  he  was  from 
a political  point  of  view,  was  the  greatest  patron  of  art 
that  ever  occupied  a Chinese  throne.  In  his  capital, 
K’ai-fong-fu,  he  imited  the  most  extensive  art  treasures 
consisting  of  bronzes,  works  in  jade,  paintings,  and  manu- 
scripts. Among  an  enormous  number  of  bronzes  there 
were  148  vessels  which  Wang  Fu  ascribes  to  the  Shang 
dynasty.  In  1749  the  Emperor  K’ien-lung  of  the  present 
dynasty  caused  a magnificent  illustrated  catalogue  of 
ancient  bronzes  to  be  published  by  a committee  of  scholars, 
in  which,  besides  those  previously  known,  a number  of 
Shang  examples,  apparently  not  known  to  Wang  Fu,  were 
described  and  illustrated;  and  further  additions  were 
made  in  a publication  of  the  year  1822,  the  Kin-shl-so  in 
twelve  books. 


74 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


These  bronze  works  of  the  Shang  dynasty,  with  their 
inscriptions,  and  a few  ballads  in  the  Shi-king,  “Book  of 
Odes,”  are  the  chief  monuments  that  throw  light  on  the 
culture  of  that  period.  The  inscriptions  of  these,  as  of 
later  bronze  vessels,  have  been  collected  in  numerous  works. 
The  Chinese  method  of  taking  rubbings  of  old  inscriptions 
and  transferring  them  to  wooden  blocks  for  printing  greatly 
facilitates  the  publication  of  illustrations  for  works  of 
this  kind.  The  best  known  thesaurus  of  hieroglyphic 
legends,  found  in  nearly  every  good  collection  of  Chinese 
books,  is  the  Chung-ting-i-k’i-kuan-shl,  published  in  1804 
by  Yiian  Yuan  (died  in  1849),  the  great  statesman  and 
scholar,  well  known  for  his  obstructive  policy  as  viceroy  of 
Canton  in  dealing  with  foreign  relations.  This  work  con- 
tains facsimiles  of  all  the  hieroglyphic  inscriptions  on  the 
oldest  bronze  vessels  known  up  to  his  time.  Of  these 
about  170  short  inscriptions  appear  on  sacrificial  vessels 
and  bells  ascribed  to  the  Shang  dynasty.  Yuan  Yiian 
faithfully  reproduces  the  opinions  of  former  native  archae- 
ologists, who  deserve  all  credit  for  unbiased  conservatism 
in  judgment;  and  the  critical  apparatus  contained  in  his 
commentary  presents  ample  proof  of  the  care  with  which 
native  students  have  sifted  the  several  arguments  for  or 
against  the  genuineness  of  each  of  these  inscriptions.  Such 
as  it  is,  Yiian  Yiian’s  “Thesaurus  of  Hieroglyphics,”  while 
probably  containing  far  less  than  the  entire  treasury  of 
words  which  might  then  have  been  included,  may  serve  to 
throw  some  light  on  the  civilization  of  that  remote 
period.'  I shall  attempt  a rapid  survey  of  the  hiero- 

* Cf.  Frank  H.  Chalfant,  Early  Chinese  Writing,  reprinted  from 
Memoirs  of  the  Carnegie  Museum  (Pittsburg),  vol.  iv,  no.  1,  Septem- 
ber, 1906. 


THE  SHANG,  OR  YIN,  DYNASTY  (1766-1122  b.c.)  75 


glyphic  material  contained  in  Yuan  Yiian’s  work,  as  far  as 
deciphered  by  native  critics.  We  find  in  it  the  following 
words : — 


(a)  NOUNS  AND  PRONOUNS 

The  technical  names  of  a number  of  sacrificial  vessels 
such  as  ting,  i,  tsun,  etc. ; the  words  for  bell,  spear,  arrow, 
bow,  and  hatchet,  the  last  two  names  being  merely  the 
pictures  of  those  articles;  carriage,  broom,  cowries  (the 
oldest  means  of  exchange),  and  possibly  amber;  further, 
the  terms  for  wood  or  tree,  vessel  or  vase,  clothes,  field, 
palace,  gate.  Among  the  terms  representing  persons  we 
find  father,  mother,  son,  grandson,  uncle,  woman,  wife, 
ancestor,  friend,  prince  or  king,  minister  of  state,  military 
leader,  lord.  Names  of  animals  are  represented  solely  by 
hawk  and  pictures  of  the  horse,  tiger,  and  deer,  the  meaning 
being  uncertain.  Apart  from  these  are  foimd  the  terms 
for  sun  or  day,  moon  or  month,  year,  evening,  family,  ter- 
ritory, history,  beginning,  middle,  orders,  sacrifice,  and 
happiness;  the  pronoun  denoting  he,  she,  it. 


(6)  QUALITIES,  NUMBERS,  ETC. 

West  and  east,  precious,  eternal,  good,  military,  wild  or 
rude,  and  nearly  all  the  cardinal  numbers,  including  wan 
(“  myriad  ”). 

(c)  VERBS 

To  make,  use,  complete,  uphold,  guard,  register,  engrave, 
bestow,  rely  upon,  see,  arise,  spread  out  (as  troops),  move, 
mourn,  admonish,  say,  drink,  and  follow. 

Of  personal  names,  which  are  mostly  compounds,  of 


76 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


one  of  the  above  words  and  a cyclical  character,  I have 
already  spoken. 

The  odes  of  the  Shi-king,  a collection  of  popular  songs 
compiled  by  Confucius,  probably  contain  a number  of 
specimens  representing  Shang-lore,  if  not  the  very  text 
handed  down  from  the  Shang  period.  But  such  a sup- 
position rests  on  nothing  better  than  conjecture,  since 
historical  allusions,  which  would  enable  us  to  refer  them 
to  some  particular  period,  are  wanting.  The  Chinese  con- 
sider one  particular  ode  as  the  oldest  to  which  a date  can 
be  assigned,*  of  which  I shall  speak  later  on ; and  since  this 
does  not  take  us  farther  than  the  eighth  century  b.c.,  we 
have  to  content  ourselves  with  the  idea  that  some  portions 
of  the  Sh'i-king  may  possibly  reach  beyond  the  time  of 
Wu-wang. 

What  we  know  about  the  culture  of  the  Shang  epoch 
and  the  legendary  periods  preceding  it,  apart  from  these 
monuments  of  art,  appears  in  the  historical  accounts  of 
the  Shu-king,  the  dry-as-dust  annals  of  the  Bamboo  Books, 
Ssi-ma  Ts’ien’s  Shi-ki,  and  the  occasional  remarks  found 
in  Confucian  and  later  literature.  The  Shu-king  is  a his- 
torical source  which  becomes  the  more  suspicious  the  more 
it  enters  into  the  detail  of  cultural  life ; and  I,  for  one,  am 
inclined  to  think  that  much  of  what  we  read  about  those 
beautiful  maxims  of  social  and  official  life  preserved  in  the 
speeches  of  emperors  and  ministers,  supposed  to  have  been 
made  during  the  earliest  periods  from  Yau  and  Shun  and 
the  great  Yii  down  to  Chou-sin,  are  merely  the  philosophical 
views  of  Confucian  sages,  who  fitted  them  into  a chronologi- 
cal framework  of  their  own  invention,  in  order  to  make  a 
deeper  impression  on  the  people.  In  this,  if  ever  it  was 
* Shi-wu-k’  i-yuan,  eh.  iv,  p.  3. 


THE  SHANG,  OR  YIN,  DYNASTY  (1766-1122  b.c.)  77 


their  intention,  they  have  succeeded  perfectly.  The  old 
emperor  lore,  divested  of  this  chronological  framework, 
may  be  regarded  as  dramatized  social  philosophy  of  the 
sixth  and  fifth  centuries  b.c.  Considered  in  this  light,  it 
certainly  is  of  great  value  from  a cultural  point  of  view. 
The  few  traces  of  real  cultural  development  found  in  these 
alleged  old  records  may  be  due  to  traditions  still  alive  at 
the  time  when  they  were  amalgamated  with  contempo- 
raneous lore. 

It  will  ever  be  a matter  of  regret  that  we  are  not  in  a 
position  to  support  the  most  ancient  history  of  China  by 
unchallengeable  monuments  such  as  those  of  ancient 
Egypt.  Had  Napoleon  I appeared  with  his  army  on  the 
banks  of  the  Yellow  River  instead  of  on  the  Nile,  his  his- 
torical conscience  would  not  have  entitled  him  to  inform 
his  soldiers  that  “four  thousand  years  looked  down  upon 
them”  without  adding  emphatically  the  word  “perhaps.” 
He  could  more  confidently  have  said  “three  thousand,” 
though  he  would  have  looked  in  vain  for  witnesses  to  im- 
press the  imagination  of  his  hearers,  such  as  the  venerable 
pyramids  of  Gizeh  or  the  temple  ruins  of  Luxor  and  Karnac. 
With  the  exception  of  the  Great  Wall,  an  almost  modern 
structure  when  compared  with  its  Egyptian  rivals,  and  a 
few  tombs  of  doubtful  identity,  China  has  only  literary 
evidence  to  advance  in  support  of  the  antiquity  of  her  cul- 
ture. Its  oldest  extant  witnesses  are  the  sacrificial  vessels 
and  bells  of  the  Shang  and  Chou  dynasties.  Of  them  we 
possess  faithful  descriptions  with  rubbings  of  the  hiero- 
glyphics found  on  them.  But  who  is  able  to  tell  the  differ- 
ence between  an  original  actually  dating,  say,  from  the  fif- 
teenth century  b.c.,  and  a clever  recast  or  an  imitation  made 
two  thousand  years  later,  such  as  have  been  prepared  in 


78 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


thousands  of  copies  ever  since  the  Han  dynasty?  These, 
the  only  monuments  of  the  second  millennium  b.c.  and  the 
succeeding  Chou  dynasty,  are  now  scattered  throughout 
the  world.  They  are  found  in  the  curiosity  shops  of  Japan, 
the  museums  of  Europe,  and  the  drawing-rooms  of  American 
millionaires.  We  are  bound  to  acknowledge  the  hona  fides 
of  these  witnesses  of  ancient  culture,  whether  genuine  or 
not,  since  a recast,  or  a close  imitation,  or  even  a good  book 
illustration,  is  to  us  as  good  as  an  original,  so  long  as  the 
ancient  style  has  been  preserved  in  its  purity;  and  we 
hardly  ever  meet  with  specimens  where  this  is  not  the 
case.  The  material  furnished  by  these  remnants  of  Shang 
and  Chou  art  may  be  scanty  as  compared  to  the  records 
of  literature;  but  this  much  may  be  said  in  their  favor, 
that  they  have  not  been  tampered  with  by  literary  editors. 

The  culture  of  the  Shang  period,  as  far  as  the  religious 
life  of  rulers,  grandees,  and  people,  and  the  social  relations 
between  them  are  concerned,  we  may  assume  to  be  reflected 
in  that  mirror  held  up  by  the  historians  of  the  Chou  dy- 
nasty; and  what  we  learn  about  the  legendary  emperors 
Yau,  Shun,  and  Yii  may  be  held  to  apply  more  aptly  to 
the  period  immediately  preceding  the  Chou  epoch  than  to 
the  more  remote  ones.  From  the  records  of  the  Shu-king 
we  are  bound  to  admit  that  the  ancient  Chinese  were 
decided  monotheists.  Shang-ti,  “the  Supreme  ruler,”  re- 
ceived as  much  veneration  at  the  hands  of  his  people  as 
did  God,  under  any  name,  from  any  contemporaneous 
nation.  The  religious  instinct  of  the  Shang  and  Chdu 
rulers  may  have  been  less  romantic  than  that  of  Homeric 
Greece,  but  it  came  nearer  the  Christian  standard  than 
that  of  many  another  nation  of  antiquity.  The  worship 
of  other  spiritual  beings  was  less  developed  than  it  has 


THE  SHANG,  OR  YIN,  DYNASTY  (1766-1122  b.c.)  79 


become  in  the  China  of  later  centuries.  Religion  was  not 
in  the  hands  of  priests;  but  the  father  was  the  priest  for 
his  family,  the  prince  of  each  state  for  his  people,  and  the 
“Son  of  Heaven”  for  the  empire.  The  emperor’s  duties 
in  his  capacity  as  high  priest  of  the  nation  were  not  a mat- 
ter of  personal  belief,  but  formed  the  most  important  part 
of  his  position. 

The  ideas  entertained  by  the  ancient  Chinese  of  the  one 
God,  ranking  above  all  the  other  spirits,  such  as  Sun,  Moon, 
and  Stars,  the  “Five  Sacred  Mountains,”  Heaven  and 
Earth,  his  creatures,  as  represented  in  the  accounts  of  the 
Shu-king,  are  well  described  by  Legge  * as  follows : — 

“The  name  by  which  God  was  designated  was  ‘the  Ruler’  and 
‘the  Supreme  Ruler,’  denoting  emphatically  his  personality, 
supremacy,  and  unity.  We  find  it  constantly  interchanged  with 
the  term  ‘Heaven,’  by  which  the  ideas  of  supremacy  and  unity  are 
equally  conveyed,  while  that  of  personality  is  only  indicated  vaguely, 
and  by  an  association  of  the  mind.  By  God  kings  were  supposed 
to  reign,  and  princes  were  required  to  decree  justice.  All  were 
under  law  to  Him  and  bound  to  obey  His  will.  Even  on  the  in- 
ferior people  He  has  conferred  a moral  sense,  compliance  with  which 
would  show  their  nature  invariably  right.  All  powers  that  be  are 
from  Him.  He  raises  one  to  the  throne  and  puts  down  another. 
Obedience  is  sure  to  receive  His  blessing;  disobedience,  to  be  visited 
with  His  curse.  The  business  of  kings  is  to  rule  in  righteousness 
and  benevolence,  so  that  the  people  may  be  happy  and  good.  They 
are  to  be  an  example  to  all  in  authority,  and  to  the  multitudes  under 
them.  Their  highest  achievement  is  to  cause  the  people  tranquilly 
to  pursue  the  course  which  their  moral  nature  would  indicate  and 
approve.  When  they  are  doing  wrong,  God  admonishes  them  by 
judgments,  storms,  famine,  and  other  calamities;  if  they  persist  in 
evil,  sentence  goes  forth  against  them.  The  dominion  is  taken  from 
them,  and  given  to  others  more  worthy  of  it.  The  Duke  of  Chou  in 
his  address  on  ‘ The  Establishment  of  Government  ’ gives  a striking 
} Shu-king,  Prolegomena,  p.  193  seqq. 


80 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


summary  of  the  history  of  the  empire  down  to  his  own  time.  Yii  the 
Great,  the  founder  of  the  Hia  dynasty,  sought  for  able  men  to  honor 
God.  But  the  way  of  Ki4,  the  last  of  his  line,  was  different.  He 
employed  cruel  men;  and  he  had  no  successors.  The  empire  was 
given  to  T’ang  the  Successful  [Ch’ong-t’ang],  who  ‘greatly  ad- 
ministered the  bright  ordinances  of  God.’  By  and  by  T’ang’s 
throne  came  to  Chou-sin,  who  was  all  violence,  so  that  God  sov- 
ereignly punished  him.  The  empire  was  transferred  to  the  house  of 
Chou,  whose  chiefs  showed  their  fitness  for  the  charge  by  finding 
out  men  who  would  reverently  serve  God,  and  appointing  them  as 
presidents  and  chiefs  of  the  people. 

“It  was  the  duty  of  all  men  to  reverence  and  honor  God,  by 
obeying  His  law  written  in  their  hearts,  and  seeking  His  blessing 
in  all  their  ways ; but  there  was  a solemn  and  national  worship  of 
Him,  as  ruling  in  nature  and  providence,  which  could  only  be  per- 
formed by  the  emperor.  It  consisted  of  sacrifices,  or  offerings 
rather,  and  prayers.  No  image  was  formed  of  Him,  as  indeed  the 
Chinese  have  never  thought  of  fashioning  a likeness  of  the  Supreme.” 

Besides  God  as  the  Supreme  Ruler,  the  Shang  rulers 
and  their  alleged  predecessors  are  shown  in  the  Shu-king 
to  have  worshiped  several  minor  deities,  if  we  may  so 
call  them.  Legge  speaks  of  this  phase  of  religious  life  in 
the  following  terms : — 

“Who  the  ‘six  honored  ones,’  whom  Shun  sacrificed  to  next  to 
God,  were,  is  not  known.  In  going  on  to  worship  the  hills  and 
rivers,  and  the  host  of  spirits,  he  must  have  supposed  that  there  were 
certain  tutelary  beings,  who  presided  over  the  more  conspicuous 
objects  of  nature,  and  its  various  processes.  They  were  under 
God  and  could  do  nothing,  excepting  as  they  were  permitted  and 
empowered  by  Him;  but  the  worship  of  them  was  inconsistent 
with  the  truth  that  God  demands  to  be  recognized  as  ‘He  who 
worketh  all  in  all,’  and  will  allow  no  religious  homage  to  be  given 
to  any  but  Himself.  It  must  have  always  been  the  parent  of  many 
superstitions ; and  it  paved  the  way  for  the  pantheism  which  enters 
largely  into  the  belief  of  the  Chinese  at  the  present  day,  and  of  which 
we  find  one  of  the  earliest  steps  in  the  practice,  which  commenced 


THE  SHANG,  OR  YIN,  DYNASTY  (1766-1122  b.c.)  81 


with  the  Ch6u  dynasty,  of  not  only  using  the  term  ‘ Heaven  ’ as  a 
synonym  for  God,  but  the  combination  Heaven  and  Earth.” 

Ancestor  worship,  the  leading  feature  of  all  religious 
belief  among  the  Chinese  down  to  the  present  day,  must 
have  taken  its  rise  long  before  historical  times,  since  allu- 
sions to  it  in  the  Shu-king  are  referred  to  the  times  of  the 
legendary  emperors.  Legge  says  with  regard  to  it : — 

“There  was  also  among  the  early  Chinese  the  religious  worship 
of  their  departed  friends,  which  still  continues  to  be  observed  by 
all  classes  from  the  emperor  downward,  and  seems  of  all  religious 
services  to  have  the  greatest  hold  upon  the  people.  The  title  given 
in  the  Shu  to  Shun’s  minister  of  religion  is  that  of  ‘ Arranger  of  the 
Ancestral  Temple.’  The  rule  of  Confucius,  that  ‘parents  when 
dead  should  be  sacrificed  to  according  to  propriety,’  was  doubtless 
in  accordance  with  a practice  which  had  come  down  from  the  earliest 
times  of  the  nation. 

“The  spirits  of  the  departed  were  supposed  to  have  a knowledge 
of  the  circumstances  of  their  descendants,  and  to  be  able  to  affect 
them.  Events  of  importance  in  a family  were  communicated  to 
them  before  their  shrines ; many  affairs  of  government  were  trans- 
acted in  the  ancestral  temple.  When  Yau  demitted  to  Shun  the 
business  of  the  government,  the  ceremony  took  place  in  the  temple 
of  ‘the  accomplished  ancestor,’  the  individual  to  whom  Yau  traced 
his  possession  of  the  supreme  dignity ; and  while  Yau  lived.  Shun,  on 
every  return  to  the  capital  from  his  administrative  progresses,  offered 
a bullock  before  the  shrine  of  the  same  personage.  In  the  same 
way,  when  Shun  found  the  toils  of  government  too  heavy  for  him,  and 
called  Yii  to  share  them,  the  ceremony  took  place  in  the  temple 
of  ‘ the  spiritual  ancestor,’  the  chief  in  the  line  of  Shun’s  progenitors. 
In  the  remarkable  narrative,  which  we  have  in  the  sixth  of  the  books 
of  Chou,  of  the  Duke  of  Chou’s  praying  for  the  recovery  of  his 
brother,  King  Wu,  from  a dangerous  illness,  and  offering  to  die  in 
his  stead,  he  raises  three  altars,  to  their  father,  grandfather,  and 
great-grandfather,  and  prays  to  them  as  having  in  heaven  the  charge 
of  watching  over  their  great  descendant.  When  he  has  ascertained 


G 


82 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


by  divination  that  the  king  would  recover,  he  declares  that  he  had 
got  Wu’s  tenure  of  the  throne  renewed  by  the  three  kings,  who  had 
thus  consulted  for  a long  futurity  of  their  House. 

“ This  case  shows  us  that  the  spirits  of  good  kings  were  believed 
to  be  in  heaven.  A more  general  conclusion  is  derived  from  what 
we  read  in  the  seventh  of  the  Books  of  Shang.  The  Emperor  P’an- 
kong,  irritated  by  the  opposition  of  the  wealthy  and  powerful  Houses 
to  his  measures,  and  their  stirring  up  the  people  also  to  murmur 
against  them,  threatens  them  all  with  calamities  to  be  sent  down 
by  his  high  ancestor,  T’ang  the  Successful.  He  tells  his  ministers 
that  their  ancestors  and  fathers,  who  had  loyally  served  his  predeces- 
sors were  now  urgently  entreating  T’ang,  in  his  spirit-state  in  heaven, 
to  execute  great  punishments  on  their  descendants.  Not  only, 
therefore,  did  good  sovereigns  continue  to  have  a happy  existence 
in  heaven,  but  their  good  ministers  shared  the  happiness  with  them, 
and  were  somehow  round  about  them,  as  they  had  been  on  earth, 
and  took  an  interest  in  the  concerns  which  had  occupied  them  dur- 
ing their  lifetime.  Modern  scholars,  following  in  the  wake  of  Con- 
fucius, to  whom  the  future  state  of  the  departed  was  all  wrapt  in 
shadows,  clouds,  and  darkness,  say  that  the  people  of  the  Shang 
dynasty  were  very  superstitious.  My  object  is  to  bring  out  the  fact 
and  the  nature  of  their  superstition. 

“There  is  no  hint  in  the  Shu,  nor  elsewhere,  so  far  as  I am  aware, 
of  what  became  of  bad  emperors  and  bad  ministers  after  death,  nor 
indeed  of  the  future  fate  of  men  generally.  There  is  a heaven  in 
the  classical  books  of  the  Chinese;  but  there  is  no  hell,  and  no 
purgatory.  Their  oracles  are  silent  as  to  any  doctrine  of  future 
rewards  and  punishments.  Their  exhortations  to  well-doing  and 
their  warnings  against  evil  are  all  based  on  a reference  to  the  will 
of  God,  and  the  certainty  that  in  this  life  virtue  will  be  rewarded 
and  vice  punished.  Of  the  five  happinesses  the  first  is  long  life; 
the  second  is  riches ; the  third  is  soundness  of  body  and  serenity  of 
mind ; the  fourth  is  the  love  of  virtue,  and  the  fifth  is  doing  or  re- 
ceiving to  the  end  the  will  of  Heaven.  There  is  no  promise  of  rest 
or  comfort  beyond  the  grave.  The  virtuous  man  may  live  and  die 
in  suffering  and  disgrace;  let  him  be  cheered.  His  posterity  will 
reap  the  reward  of  his  merits.  Some  one  sprung  from  his  loins 
will  become  wealthy,  or  attain  to  distinction.  But  if  he  should 


THE  SHANG,  OR  YIN,  DYNASTY  (1766-1122  b.c.)  83 


have  no  posterity  — it  never  occurred  to  any  of  the  ancient  sages 
to  consider  such  a case. 

“ I will  pass  on  from  this  paragraph  with  a reference  to  the  sub- 
ject of  divination.  Although  the  ancient  Chinese  can  hardly  be 
said  to  have  had  the  knowledge  of  a future  state,  and  were  not 
curious  to  inquire  about  it,  they  were  anxious  to  know  about  the 
wisdom  and  issues  of  their  plans  for  the  present  life.  For  this  pur- 
pose they  had  recourse  to  divination.  The  Duke  of  Chou  certainly 
practised  it;  and  we  have  a regular  staff  of  diviners  among  the 
officers  of  the  Chou  dynasty.  P’an-kong  practised  it  in  the  dynasty 
of  Shang.  And  Shun  did  so  also,  if  we  can  put  faith  in  the  ‘ Counsels 
of  Yii.’  The  instruments  of  divination  were  the  shell  of  the  tortoise 
and  the  stalks  of  a certain  grass  or  reed.  By  various  caustic  opera- 
tions on  the  former,  and  by  manipulations  with  the  latter,  it  was 
supposed  possible  to  ascertain  the  will  of  Heaven.  It  is  difficult 
to  understand  how  the  really  great  men  of  ancient  China  could  have 
believed  it.  One  observation  ascribed  to  Shun  is  worthy  of  remark. 
He  tells  Yii  that  divination,  when  fortunate,  must  not  be  repeated. 
I once  saw  a father  and  son  divining  after  one  of  the  fashions  of 
the  present  day.  They  tossed  the  bamboo  roots  which  came  down 
in  the  unlucky  positions  for  a dozen  times  in  succession.  At  last 
a lucky  cast  was  made . They  looked  into  each  other ’s  faces,  laughed 
heartily,  and  rose  up  delighted  from  their  knees.  The  divination 
was  now  successful;  and  they  dared  not  repeat  it.” 

Sacrificial  service,  we  may  conclude  from  all  we  read  in 
the  Shu-king  and  other  accounts  relating  to  the  Shang 
dynasty,  was  the  leading  feattire  in  the  spiritual  life  of 
the  Chinese,  whether  devoted  to  Shang-ti  or  God,  or  to 
what  we  may  call  the  minor  deities  as  being  subordinate 
to  “the  Supreme  Ruler”  or  to  the  spirits  of  their  ancestors. 
That  minuteness  of  detail  which  up  to  the  present  day 
governs  the  entire  religious  and  social  life  of  the  Chinese 
gentleman,  the  more  so  the  higher  he  is  in  the  social  scale, 
and  most  of  all  in  the  case  of  the  emperor  himself,  had 
clearly  commenced  to  affect  public  and  private  life  long 


84 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


before  the  ascendency  of  the  Chou  dynasty,  under  which 
rule  it  reached  its  highest  development  to  serve  as  a 
pattern  to  future  generations.  The  vessels  preserved  as 
living  witnesses  of  that  quasi-religious  relation  between 
man  and  the  unseen  powers  supposed  to  influence  his 
life  are  full  of  symbolic  ornament.  Each  of  their  mani- 
fold shapes  is  devoted  to  a special  purpose,  which  in  those 
days  had  nothing  to  do  with  the  burning  of  incense,  a 
form  of  worship  peculiar  to  Buddhism  and  other  modern 
cults  rather  than  to  the  rites  of  the  Shang  period.  The 
bronze  vessels  of  the  Shang  and  Chou  epochs  were  used 
for  holding  viands  placed  before  the  spirits  worshiped, 
or  wines  for  libations  to  be  made  to  them.  The  term 
"censer”  often  applied  to  them  is  a misnomer;  for,  al- 
though the  Chinese  of  later  ages  have  used  such  vessels  for 
holding  ashes  of  incense  burned  in  them,  their  prototypes 
were  not  made  for  that  purpose.  The  shapes  of  sacrificial 
vases,  pots,  and  bottles  invented  during,  if  not  before,  the 
Shang  dynasty  were  perfected  under  the  Chou,  and  have, 
in  the  course  of  imitation,  become  the  models  in  the  later 
jade  and  ceramic  industries.  They  have  thus  exercised  no 
little  influence  on  European  pottery,  the  forms  of  which  are 
in  their  origin  not  confined  to  the  models  handed  down  by 
Greece  and  Rome. 

Among  the  ornaments  engraved  on  the  outer  surface  of 
Shang  vessels  is  one  occurring  in  great  frequency.  It 
represents  the  conventionalized  face  of  a monster  with  a 
feline  expression,  called  T’au-t'ie  by  the  Chinese,  the  old 
pronunciation  of  which  name  was  probably  t’o-t'it,  t'o-tHn, 
or  t’o-tHm.  I cannot  endorse  the  attempt  made  ‘ to  con- 
nect this  sound  with  Greek  Tavde,  which  is  derived  from 
' China  und  Babylon,  in  Beilage  zur  Allgemeinen  Zeitung,  July  25, 1903. 


THE  SHANG,  OR  YIN,  DYNASTY  (1766-1122  b.c.)  85 


the  cuneiform  Tidmat,^  nor  do  I think  that  the  attempts 
to  connect  the  name  with  similar  words  in  west-Asiatic 
languages  will  be  crowned  with  success.  From  the  defini- 
tions of  the  oldest  Chinese  dictionaries  it  appears  that  the 
two  syllables  representing  that  name  are  separate  Chinese 
words  of  which  the  first,  t'au,  means  “ greedy  of  eating  and 
drinking,”  the  second,  t'ie,  “craving  for  money  and  prop- 
erty.” So  it  is  explained  in  the  Tso-chuan,  the  ancient 
commentary  on  the  Ch’un-ts’iu,  or  “Spring  and  Autumn 
Annals.”  ^ There  the  term  occurs  in  connection  with  four 
parallel  names,  each  of  which  represents  the  personifica- 
tion of  some  abominable  quality.  Whether  their  bearers 
were  persons  or  tribes,  the  Emperor  Shun  “ banished  these 
four  wicked  ones,  ‘Chaos,’  ‘Monster,’  ‘Block,’  and  ‘Glutton’ 
[the  last  being  Legge’s  translation  for  t^au-t’ie],  to  meet  the 
spite  of  the  sprites  and  evil  things.  The  consequence  of 
this  was,  that  when  Yau  died,  all  under  Heaven,  as  if  they 
had  been  one  man  with  common  consent  bore  Shun  to  be 
emperor,  because  ...  he  had  put  away  the  four  wicked 
ones.”  The  terms  used  for  what  Legge  translates  by 
“Chaos,”  “Monster,”  “Block,”  and  “Glutton”  are  built 
up  on  a uniform  plan  by  combining  two  words  of  evil  sig- 
nificance. According  to  one  of  the  commentaries  the 
Glutton,  or  T’au-t’ie,  was  identical  with  a personage  or  tribe 
(for  it  appears  to  be  an  ethnic  name)  called  San-miau,  whom 
the  emperor  banished  from  his  dominions  and  who  originally 
occupied  the  regions  about  Mt.  Hong-shan  and  the  shores 
of  Tung-t’ing  Lake  in  the  present  Hu-nan  province.  From 
these  ancient  seats  the  emperor  is  said  to  have  banished 
them  to  a place  called  San-wei,  which  Chinese  commenta- 

' Cf.  G.  Oppert,  in  Zeitschrift  fiir  Ethnologie,  1903,  p.  213.  ^ Legge, 
pp.  280,  283. 


86 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


tors  have  identified  vdth  a locality  now  known  as  San-wei- 
shan  in  the  neighborhood  of  Tun-huang-hien  in  northwest- 
ern Kan-su.  Tlie  San-iniau  are  considered  the  forefathers 
of  the  Tangutans,  or  K’iang,  the  southern  neighbors  of  the 
Yiie-chi,  or  Indo-Scythians,  before  their  great  migration 
westward  in  the  second  century  b.c.  and  of  the  Miau-tzi 
tribes.  If  Klaproth’s  derivation,  based  on  Chinese  notices, 
of  the  origin  of  the  Tibetan  race  from  these  K’iang  tribes 
holds  good,‘  the  legend  of  the  banishment  by  the  Emperor 
Shun  of  the  San-miau,  their  ancestors,  may  be  looked  upon 
as  a symbolic  allusion  to  the  shifting  of  their  aboriginal 
seats.  It  would  appear  from  this  tradition  that  Tangutans, 
Tibetans,  and  Miau-tzi  originally  occupied  the  north  of 
Hu-nan  province  and  were  thence  driven  westward,  owing 
to  the  rapid  growth  of  the  Chinese  race.  Legge^  appro- 
priately remarks  in  connection  with  this  piece  of  folk-lore ; 
“The  references  to  men  and  things  in  what  we  may  call 
the  prehistoric  period  were,  no  doubt,  in  accordance  with 
traditions  current  at  the  time,  though  we  cannot  accept 
them  as  possessed  of  historical  authority,  more  especially 
as  there  is  an  anti-Confucian  spirit  in  what  is  said  of 
Yau.” 

The  story  of  the  banishment  of  the  San-miau  has  been 
recapitulated  by  Ssi-ma  Ts’ien  in  his  Sh'i-ki;  ^ and  one  of 
the  commentaries  on  this  occasion  refers  to  an  early  work 
on  spirit  lore,  the  Shon-i-king,  probably  dating  from  the 
fourth  or  fifth  century  a.d.,  in  which  the  word  t'au-t'ie 
occurs  in  connection  with  the  San-miau.  The  paragraph 
from  which  this  quotation  is  taken  says : — 

* Cf.  S.  W.  Bushell,  The  Early  History  of  Tibet,  in  Journal  of  the 
Royal  Asiatic  Society,  1880,  p.  439.  ^ Ch’un-ts’iu,  p.  283.  ’ Cha- 

vannes,  op.  cit.,  vol.  i,  p.  67  et  passim. 


THE  SHAi\G,  OR  YIN,  DYNASTY  (1766-1122  b.c.)  87 


“In  the  wilds  of  the  West  there  is  a beast  shaped  like  a tiger, 
but  having  dogs'  hair  two  feet  long;  it  has  the  face  of  a man,  the 
feet  of  a tiger,  mouth  and  teeth  of  a pig,  and  a tail  eighteen  feet  in 
length.  It  infests  the  wilderness  and  is  called  T’au-wu,  i.e.  ‘ Block  ’ 
or  ‘Blockhead,’  or  Au-lang,  ‘Werwolf,’  lit.  ‘The  scornful  wolf,’  or 
Nan-sun,  ‘ the  Untamable.’  The  ‘ Spring  and  Autumn  Annals  ’ say : 
‘The  Emperor Chuan-hii  had  a degenerate  son  named  T’au-wu  with 
whom  it  is  identical.  He  had  a man’s  face  and  his  eyes,  hands  and 
feet  were  of  human  shape,  but  on  his  arms  he  had  wings,  without 
being  able  to  fly.  He  was  a man  greedy  and  voracious  [for  which 
the  words  t’au  and  t'ie  are  used],  lewd,  idle  and  void  of  reason; 
he,  or  his  people,  were  called  Miau.” 

These  are  the  San-miau  mentioned  in  the  ‘'Spring  and 
Autumn  Annals,”  of  whom  the  Shu-king  says  that  “ the 
emperor  banished  them  to  San-wei.” 

If  we  allow  for  gross  exaggerations  in  this  piece  of  folk- 
lore, the  Tibetan  mastiff,  a ferocious,  long-tailed,  and 
long-haired  hound,  probably  well  known  in  the  regions 
referred  to  in  this  passage,  may  be  the  foundation  of  it. 
Anyhow,  the  word  T’au-fie  appears  in  all  these  old  accounts 
as  a compound  adjective  with  a distinct  meaning,  “ greedy 
and  voracious.”  This  does  not  exclude  the  term  having 
originated  from  popular  etymology,  like  the  German 
Vielfrass,  a term  of  similar  meaning  as  understood  by  the 
broad  masses,  but  actually  derived  from  Norse  fjallfress, 
i.e.  “inhabitant  of  rocks,”  a bearlike  quadruped  in  the 
Scandinavian  hills.  Under  no  circumstances,  however, 
should  we  rush  to  conclusions  on  the  mere  evidence  of  a 
similarity  in  sound. 

From  all  I can  discover,  as  far  as  Chinese  tradition  goes, 
the  monster  called  T’au-t’ie  appears  to  be  a native  inven- 
tion. So  are  the  other  mythological  figures  represented  on 
the  sacrificial  vessels  of  the  Shang  dynasty,  chiefly  quad- 


88 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


rupeds,  birds,  and  reptiles,  conventionalized  to  such  a 
degree  as  to  render  it  almost  impossible  to  identify  their 
shape.  Among  them  we  find  the  dragon  and  the  phenix 
{lung  and  fong).  These  names  occur  in  the  oldest  literature, 
it  is  true,  but  the  shapes  in  which  they  are  represented  in 
those  older  works  of  art  are  quite  different  from  the  elabo- 
rate pictures  made  of  them  by  later  artists.  Tlie  pictorial 
attributes  added  by  them  do  not  appear  before  the  Han 
dynasty,  when  foreign  influences  began  to  modify  the  con- 
servative art  of  the  Shang  and  the  Chou.  I,  therefore, 
readily  adopt  the  suggestion  made  by  Professor  Chavannes, 
who  in  a review  of  my  researches  on  foreign  influences  on 
Chinese  art  says : * — 

“The  bird  one  sees  on  these  archaic  bronzes  is  generally  the 
pheasant.  I find  before  the  Han  period  nothing  that  resembles  the 
phenix ; it  appears  to  me  that  this  fantastic  bird  is  entirely  derived 
from  some  Western  legend  or  drawing;  the  dragon  itself  could  well 
be  related  to  the  nagas  of  India.  Dragon  and  phenix,  it  is  true, 
are  mentioned  in  those  writings  which,  in  the  face  of  the  rudimentary 
state  of  their  texts  as  accepted  by  Sinologues,  we  must  look  upon 
as  very  old;  but  the  traditional  shape  which  they  have  adopted 
is  of  recent  date  and  seems  to  have  been  derived  from  some  foreign 
model.  It  is  interesting  to  note  that  this  group  of  fantastic  con- 
ventionalizations is  perhaps  not  Chinese  at  all  from  the  outset, 
and  in  any  case  not  so  old  as  one  would  feel  tempted  to  believe.” 

Among  the  chief  ornaments  on  the  sacrificial  vessels  of 
the  Shang  dynasty  we  find  a combination  of  lines  which 
at  first  sight  in  some  instances  recalls  the  Egyptian  scroll 
or  Greek  pattern.  It  has,  however,  nothing  to  do  with 
the  latter,  but  is  to  be  considered  an  independent  creation 
of  Chinese  symbolism.  Chinese  archajologists  derive  its 
origin  from  the  oldest  hieroglyphic  for  “thunder,”  which 

* Journal  Asiatique,  1896,  p.  533. 


THE  SHANG,  OR  YIN,  DYNASTY  (1766-1122  b.c.)  89 


represents  a spiral,  pure  and  simple.  In  this  shape  we  find 
it  here  and  there  on  vessels  of  the  Shang  dynasty.  Since 
round  objects  are  more  difficult  to  engrave  than  square 
ones,  we  soon  find  it  changed  into  a “quadrangular  spiral,” 
if  we  may  so  call  it,  and  two  of  these  combined  yield  the 
design  called  Lei-won,  or  “thunder  pattern,”  by  the 
Chinese.  Placed  side  by  side  in  border  style,  we  often  see 
them  forming  an  ornament  somewhat  resembling  the 
Egyptian  scroll.  The  difference  is  that  the  latter  is  con- 
tinuous, whereas  in  the  genuine  Chinese  scroll  the  elements 
are  not  connected.  In  the  majority  of  cases  these  ele- 
ments are  crowded  into  empty  spaces  surrounding  some 
principal  pattern  and  thus  used  for  filling-in  purposes.  The 
symbolic  meaning  attributed  by  native  archaeologists  to 
this  pattern  is  that  of  “thunder-storm  and  rain”  as  the 
chief  benefactors  of  agriculturists. 

Besides  the  sacrificial  vessels  and  bells,  and  a few  bronze 
weapons,  such  as  spearheads  and  lances,  ascribed  to  the 
Shang  dynasty,  the  antiquities  of  this  period  are  represented 
by  a number  of  jade  specimens.  A huge  number  of  works 
in  this  material  has  been  described  in  a comprehensive  il- 
lustrative catalogue,  published  in  1176  a.d.,  under  the  title 
Ku-yii-t’u-p’u,  of  which  a new  edition  appeared  in  1779. 
Among  the  collaborators  mentioned  in  the  preface  are 
found  some  of  the  most  noteworthy  painters  of  the  period, 
especially  the  great  landscapists  Ma  Yiian,  Hia  Kui,  and 
Li  T’ang,  known  in  Japan  as  Bayen,  Kakei,  and  Rito,  who 
appear  to  have  supervised  the  preparation  of  the  numer- 
ous illustrations.  Whereas  the  critics  who  have  published 
and  interpreted  the  Chinese  bronze  treasures  do  not  go 
beyond  the  Shang  dynasty,  this  book  shows  us  jade  tablets 
covered  with  undecipherable  hieroglyphics  and  ascribed 


90 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


to  the  fabulous  Emperor  Yii.  So  say  the  inscriptions  added 
on  the  back  surface  during  the  seventh  and  tenth  centuries. 
The  characters  of  the  original  inscriptions  are  stated  in  the 
text  to  resemble  the  style  of  the  celebrated  tablet  of  Yii, 
which,  if  it  were  genuine,  would  beyond  doubt  be  the  oldest 
specimen  of  Chinese  writing  now  in  existence  and  which, 
even  if  it  is  a forgery,  must  be  one  of  very  ancient  date,  as 
Mr.  C.  T.  Gardner  has  shown  in  his  paper,  “ The  Tablet  of 
Yii.”  ‘ These  jade  tablets,  as  well  as  the  stone  inscrip- 
tion ascribed  to  the  Emperor  Yii  and  the  nine  geographical 
tripods  he  is  supposed  to  have  left  to  posterity  as  a pictorial 
record  of  the  nine  provinces  into  which  he  divided  his 
empire,  are  probably  as  doubtful  in  their  origin  as  the 
accounts  of  his  reign,  his  engineering  work,  and  his  provinces 
placed  on  record  in  the  Shu-king  and  other  works.  The 
Confucian  age  is  responsible,  it  appears  to  me,  for  forgeries 
not  only  of  literature,  but  of  art  also.  If  the  Emperor 
Huang-ti  is  reported  to  have  discovered  a copper  mine 
and  established  a foundry  in  Ho-nan  a short  time  before 
his  death,  it  appears  that  the  forger  of  literature  merely 
works  into  the  hands  of  the  inventor  of  Yii ’s  tripods.  The 
Ku-yu-t’u-p’u  contains  a number  of  illustrations  showing 
that  numerous  copies  were  made  in  jade  of  the  ancient 
sacrificial  vessels  of  the  Shang  period  as  well  as  of  the  Chou 
dynasty.  Yet,  although  it  appears  that  the  style  has  been 
well  preserved  in  these  imitations,  they  are  for  the  greater 
part  declared  even  by  the  Chinese  archeologists  to  be 

* China  Review,  vol.  ii,  p.  293  seqq.  Cf.  also  E.  Haenisch,  Die 
Tafel  des  Yii,  in  Mittheilungen  des  Seminars  fiir  Orientalische  Spra- 
chen,  vol.  viii,  1905,  p.  293  seqq.  Mr.  Haenisch  thinks  the  tablet  is 
not  a forgery,  but  an  ancient  monument,  which  has  nothing  to  do 
with  Yii. 


THE  SHAKO,  OR  YIN,  DYNASTY  (1766-1122  b.c.)  91 


works  of  the  Han  period.  I do  not  wish  to  say  that  jade 
sculptures  were  an  impossibility  during  the  Shang  period. 
Indeed,  we  read  of  gems  and  badges  of  rank,  which  may,  or 
may  not,  have  been  made  of  jade,  and  the  word  yu,  “jade,” 
occurs  over  and  over  again  in  the  oldest  texts.  It  must 
also  be  admitted  that  jade,  or  jadeite,  may  in  the  course  of 
trade  have  come  to  China  from  quarries  in  other  countries, 
if  not  from  Khotan,  without  the  Chinese  having  been  aware 
of  its  origin.  But  it  is  not  likely  that  this  industry  existed 
on  a very  large  scale  previous  to  the  Han  dynasty.  The 
jade  quarries  of  Khotan,  which  have  ever  since  the  Han 
dynasty  had  the  lion’s  share  of  the  trade  in  that  precious 
material  as  far  as  China  is  concerned,  were  not  known  to 
the  Chinese  before  the  end  of  the  second  century  b.c. 

It  is  a remarkable  feature  of  that  old  catalogue  of  jade 
works  that  during  all  this  time,  from  the  first  century  b.c. 
down  to  the  twelfth  century  a.d.,  almost  every  one  of  the 
jade  vessels  and  implements  represented  in  it  has  its  proto- 
type in  the  shape  of  an  old  bronze  object.  The  Chinese  of 
the  Shang  dynasty  must  be  considered  as  the  creators  of 
Chinese  autochthonous  art.  At  this  time  the  foundation 
for  much  of  the  later  development  was  laid.  We  are  en- 
titled to  adopt  this  view  on  the  strength  of  existing  monu- 
ments of  Shang  culture  in  the  shape  of  sacrificial  bronzes 
bearing  testimony  more  substantial  than  mere  literary 
fabrications. 


IV-VIII 

THE  CHOU  DYNASTY  (1122-249  b.c.) 


IV.  FROM  WU-WANG  TO  K'ANG-WANG:  THE 

PERIOD  OF  IMPERIAL  AUTHORITY 


IV 


FROM  WU-WANG  TO  K’ANG-WANG:  THE  PERIOD  OF 
IMPERIAL  AUTHORITY 

§ 22.  Wu-WANG  AS  King  of  Chou  (1122-1116  b.c.) 

After  the  death  of  Chou-sin,  Wu-wang  became  mas- 
ter of  the  empire.  The  renitent  among  the  former 
adherents  of  Chou-sin  had  dispersed  in  the  hills. 
Wu-wang  rejected  the  advice  given  him  to  persecute  them, 
and  invited  those  who  promised  to  become  loyal  subjects 
to  return.  On  the  other  hand,  he  treated  the  refractory 
with  great  severity.  One  of  Chou-sin’s  former  ministers, 
Shang  Jung,  greatly  assisted  him  in  appeasing  the  startled 
population,  and  he  soon  found  himself  universally  recog- 
nized as  “Son  of  Heaven”  {t’ien-tzi).  This  is  the  style  by 
which  the  holder  of  the  supreme  authority  is  designated 
in  China,  whatever  his  other  titles  may  be.  The  term  has 
been  applied  to  the  legendary  emperors;  the  great  Yii  calls 
himself  “Son  of  Heaven”  in  one  of  his  speeches  preserved 
in  the  Shu-king.  The  Shang  emperors  used  the  same  title, 
and  if  Wu-wang  is  so  described,  he  is  virtually  emperor  of 
China,  who  rules  over  his  people  — the  people  par  excel- 
lence — whose  lord  has  received  the  approval  of  Heaven, 
who  rules  the  world  in  the  name  of  Heaven,  and  who  is 
the  representative  of  the  t’ien-hia,  “what  is  under  heaven,” 
“the  world,”  “the  Chinese  people.”  T’ien-tzi  may  in  this 
sense  be  appropriately  translated  by  “Son  of  God,”  a 

96 


96 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


designation  for  which  it  is  easy  to  find  parallels  in  the  his- 
tory of  both  Oriental  and  Occidental  nations.  For,  al- 
though shang-ti,  “the  Supreme  Ruler,”  may  be  looked 
upon  as  the  very  term  for  God  in  pre-Confucian  monotheism, 
T’icn,  “ Heaven,”  has  very  much  the  same  force  as  a term 
in  the  natural  philosophy  of  the  Chinese.  In  one  sense 
it  means  the  other  world,  and  the  term  is  actually  applied 
to  the  Mahomedan  heaven  in  the  account  of  a calif al 
embassy  of  the  early  part  of  the  seventh  centmy  ^ accord- 
ing to  which  the  Mahomedan  who  dies  before  the  enemy 
is  born  again  in  i’ien  (“heaven”).  According  to  the 
same  account,  Mahomedans  kneel  five  times  a day  before 
i'ien-shon,  “the  spirit  of  Heaven”;  and  the  members  of 
the  calif  al  embassy  declined  to  perform  the  ceremony  of 
the  k’o-t’du,  saying  : “ The  inhabitants  of  our  country 
kneel  only  before  t’ien;  when  seeing  the  king,  they  do 
not  kneel.”  In  this  case  fieri  clearly  refers  to  Allah,  or 
God.  The  “Son  of  Heaven”  is  thus  apparently  a term 
which  may  be  compared  to  the  Homeric  8toy€vr)<;  /3ao-tXev?, 
the  epithet  Divus  of  the  Roman  emperors,  and  quite  a 
host  of  parallels  in  Oriental  titles. 

^Vhen  Wu-wang  had  become  “Son  of  Heaven,”  he 
bestowed  on  Chou-sin’s  son,  Wu-kong,  known  also  as  Lu-fu, 
who  had  tendered  him  allegiance,  the  title  of  chu-hdu, 
“Prince  of  the  Empire,”  and  appointed  him  king  of  Corea. 
The  title  ti,  “emperor,”  had  grown  unpopular  after  the 
many  examples  of  weakness  and  lack  of  virtue  displayed 
by  so  many  of  the  previous  emperors,  who  would  not 
conform  to  the  model  set  for  them  by  the  “ Five  Emperors,’ 
by  which  name  Fu-hi  and  his  immediate  successors  are 
designated.  In  his  modesty  he  continued  to  style  himself 
* T’ang-shu,  ch.  ccxxi  B,  p.  18. 


FROM  WU-WANG  TO  K’ANG-WANG 


97 


simply  wang,  or  “king,”  and  his  successors  followed  his 
example.  It  is  for  this  reason  that  down  to  the  time  of 
Shi-huang-ti,  who  purposely  ignored  all  previous  history 
and  called  himself  “The  First  Emperor,”  this  being  the 
literal  meaning  of  his  title,  all  the  rulers  of  the  Chou  dy- 
nasty styled  themselves  wang,  that  is,  “king”  or  “prince,” 
besides  holding  the  dignity  of  “ Son  of  Heaven.”  Wu-wang 
had  been  duke  of  Chou  after  the  death  of  his  father  for 
twelve  years  when  he  became  emperor.  As  such,  he  was 
virtual  ruler  of  the  Chinese  empire  from  1122  to  1116  b.c. 
Personal  qualities  and  a fine  physique,  coupled  with  great 
affability,  assisted  him  greatly  in  gaining  the  sympathy  of 
his  people ; and  this  was  increased  by  his  good  government. 
In  the  latter  he  was  assisted  by  his  brother  Tan,  known  in 
literature  as  Chou-kimg,  the  “Duke  of  Chou.”  From  the 
time  of  Won-wang’s  death  Chou-kung  was  the  soul  of 
Wu-wang’s  government,  and  to  him  must  be  ascribed  an 
important  share  in  the  consolidation  of  the  power  of  the 
Chou  dynasty.  Many  fundamental  institutions  were  the 
result  of  his  suggestions.  So  great  was  his  zeal  in  govern- 
ment matters  that,  if  summoned  on  business  matters,  he 
would  interrupt  his  bath  and  consult  with  his  interviewer 
while  holding  his  wet  hair  in  his  hand. 

After  Wu-wang  had  made  his  solemn  entrance  into  the 
capital,  he  issued  a manifesto,  destined  to  calm  the  people, 
in  which  he  promised  to  conduct  the  government  in  the 
spirit  devised  by  the  ancient  sages.  He  opened  the  prisons 
and  set  free  the  victims  of  Chou-sin’s  severity.  Chou-sin’s 
granaries  also  were  opened,  and  their  contents  distributed 
among  the  people.  The  treasures  and  luxuries  found  in 
Chou-sin’s  palace  were  used  in  rewarding  the  officers  and 
soldiers  of  Wu-wang’s  army  and  were  also  distributed 

H 


98 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


among  the  people,  for  the  king  would  not  appropriate  to 
his  own  use  any  of  those  ill-gotten  riches.  Further,  the 
many  women  assembled  in  Chou-sin’s  harem  were  allowed 
to  return  to  their  families. 

Soon  after  his  ascension  to  the  throne  he  decided  to  pay 
a visit  to  his  native  duchy  of  Chou.  He  had  found  in  the 
imperial  treasury  the  celebrated  bronze  tripods,  supposed 
to  have  been  cast  by  order  of  the  Great  Yii  and  containing 
the  descriptions  of  that  emperor’s  nine  provinces.  These 
national  relics  he  caused  to  be  transported  to  his  capital 
in  the  west,  possession  of  them  being  regarded  as  a guarantee 
of  the  security  of  the  empire.  One  of  the  first  govern- 
mental measures  taken  by  Wu-wang  was  the  regulation 
of  the  nobility  of  his  empire.  Hereditary  rank  appears  to 
have  occupied  a more  prominent  position  in  the  most 
ancient  periods  of  Chinese  history  than  during  its  modern 
development.  The  division  of  the  nobility  into  the  five 
grades  existing  at  the  present  day,  namely,  kung  {“  duke  ”), 
h6u  {“  marquis  ”),  po  {“  earl  ”),  tzi  (“  viscount  ”),  and  nan 
(“  baron  ”),  is  supposed  to  have  been  first  made  by  the  em- 
perors Yau  and  Shun.  Wu-wang  arranged  that  each  of 
these  dignitaries  should  be  allowed  to  hold  a fixed  area  of 
land.  In  selecting  the  officials  of  his  government  he  made  a 
careful  choice  among  those  of  his  predecessor,  dismissing  all 
the  incapable  ones.  He  tried  to  improve  the  moral  standard 
of  his  people,  and  paid  special  attention  to  the  welfare  of 
the  laboring  classes  as  well  as  to  industry  and  trade.  At 
the  beginning  of  his  reign  he  had  to  contend  with  some 
refractory  elements  among  his  own  people;  but  he  soon 
overcame  these,  and  established  peace  all  over  his  empire. 

He  then  devoted  himself  to  the  improvement  of  the 
calendar.  He  declared  red  to  be  the  color  of  his  reign. 


FROM  WU-WANG  TO  K’ANG-WANG 


99 


just  as  yellow  is  the  color  of  the  present  dynasty;  and  it 
was  directed  that  all  the  imperial  flags  show  this  color. 
The  old  capital  F6ng-ch’6ng,  “City  of  Affluence,”  which 
had  been  built  generations  ago  by  his  father  Won-wang, 
proving  too  small  to  hold  his  court,  he  transferred  the  seat 
of  government  to  a place  called  Hau,  situated  in  the  neigh- 
borhood of  the  modern  Si-an-fu;  and  this  remained  for  a 
long  period  during  antiquity  and  the  Middle  Ages  the 
center  of  the  Chinese  empire.  There  he  established  schools, 
divided  into  six  classes,  the  three  lower  ones  of  which  were 
to  serve  for  the  education  of  boys  of  the  age  of  eight  to 
fifteen  years.  In  admitting  young  candidates  to  the 
highest  possible  degrees  of  learning,  no  distinction  was 
made  between  high  and  low,  between  rich  and  poor.  In 
this  he  laid  the  foundation  of  that  democratic  principle 
which  has,  up  to  the  present  day,  been  characteristic  of 
the  system  of  education  and  the  subsequent  promotion  to 
high  offices  among  the  Chinese.  His  own  son,  the  heir 
presumptive  to  the  throne,  was  educated  at  one  of  these 
schools  like  the  son  of  a common  laborer.  As  a further  step 
toward  the  consolidation  of  his  power  he  surrounded  him- 
self with  a phalanx  of  faithful  supporters  to  the  throne 
by  reorganizing  that  class  of  nobility  called  chu-hou, 
“Princes  of  the  Empire,”  selected  from  the  representatives 
of  families  deriving  their  pedigree  from  the  old  sacred  em- 
perors and  other  personages  of  similar  merit.  It  appears 
that,  whether  wrongly  or  not,  descendants  of  Shon-nung, 
Huang-ti,  Yau,  and  Shun  were  supposed  to  exist,  and  that 
Wu-wang  rewarded  the  merits  of  their  respective  ancestors 
by  appointing  such  descendants  fief-holders  in  different 
parts  of  the  empire.  To.  his  own  brother,  Chdu-kung,  his 
confidential  adviser,  he  gave  the  earldom  of  Kii-fou,  called 


100 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


also  Lu,  in  whose  capital  Confucius  was  born  in  the  sixth 
century.  Other  brothers  of  his  were  made  fief-holders. 
The  sentiment  of  gratitude  thus  implanted  in  the  hearts 
of  his  grandees  remained  constant  during  their  lifetimes. 
But  later  generations  are  apt  to  be  forgetful  of  benefits 
accorded  to  predecessors — a fact  exemplified  in  the  his- 
tory of  all  nations ; and  in  this  respect  China  was  destined 
not  to  prove  an  exception. 

The  good  ones  among  the  most  ancient  rulers  of  China 
are  represented  as  having  been  full  of  religious  sentiment. 
We  meet  with  numerous  instances  of  the  most  ancient 
emperors  addressing  themselves  in  prayer  to  God  the 
Almighty,  and,  if  we  find  social  life  to  have  been  made 
dependent  in  all  its  phases  upon  thousands  of  little  cere- 
monies, all  these  served  one  end  — the  humble  recognition 
of  a powerful  fate  that  rules  us  all.  The  worship  of  an- 
cestors began  to  be  gradually  cultivated  as  a side  develop- 
ment of  this  original  monotheism.  It  culminated  in  the 
belief  that  the  spirit  of  a departed  forefather  actually  re- 
places fate  by  influencing  the  life  of  his  descendants.  I 
have  already  referred  to  the  beginning  of  ancestor  worship 
in  connection  with  the  legendary  emperors  as  early  as  the 
thirteenth  century.  The  virtuous  Emperor  P’an-kong  says, 
according  to  the  Shu-king : ‘ — 

“Were  I to  err  in  my  government,  and  remain  long  here,  my 
High  Sovereign,  the  founder  of  our  house,  would  send  down  great 
punishment  for  my  crime,  and  say,  ‘Why  do  you  oppress  my 
people  ? ’ If  you,  the  myriads  of  the  people,  do  not  attend  to  the 
perpetuation  of  your  lives,  and  cherish  one  mind  with  me,  the  one 
man  in  my  plans,  my  predecessors  will  send  down  on  you  great 
punishment  for  your  crime,  and  say : ‘ Why  do  you  not  agree  with 
our  young  grandson,  but  so  go  on  to  forfeit  your  virtue  ? ’ When 
* Legge,  p.  238. 


FROM  WU-WANG  TO  K’ANG-WANG 


101 


they  punish  you  from  above  you  will  have  no  way  of  escape.  Of 
old,  my  royal  predecessors  toiled  for  your  ancestors  and  fathers. 
You  are  equally  the  people  whom  I nourish;  but  your  conduct  is 
injurious  — it  is  cherished  in  your  hearts.  Whereas  my  royal 
predecessors  made  happy  your  ancestors  and  fathers,  your  ancestors 
and  fathers  will  cut  you  off  and  abandon  you,  and  not  save  you 
from  death.  Here  are  those  ministers  of  my  government,  who 
share  with  me  the  offices  of  the  state  — and  yet  only  think  of 
hoarding  up  cowries  [the  old  medium  of  exchange]  and  gems ! 
Your  ancestors  and  fathers  urgently  represent  to  my  High  Sovereign 
saying,  ‘Execute  great  puni.shments  on  our  descendants.’  So 
they  intimate  to  my  High  Sovereign  that  he  should  send  down  great 
calamities.” 

The  God  of  the  ancient  Chinese  was  the  creation  of  their 
own  mind  and  the  result  of  their  natural  instinct;  there 
was  no  revelation  made  to  them  resembling  our  Ten  Com- 
mandments or  the  New  Testament.  A^diether  Shang-ti, 
“the  Supreme  Ruler,”  or  T’ien,  “Heaven,”  the  real  God 
has  never  been,  as  He  is  not  now,  entirely  disavowed  by  the 
Chinese ; but  we  find  Him  occasionally  viewed  in  the  spirit 
of  that  much-quoted  precept  attributed  to  Oliver  Cromwell : 
“Put  your  trust  in  God;  but  mind  to  keep  your  powder 
dry.”  The  Shu-king  clearly  shows  this  in  a conversation 
between  one  of  the  representative  gentlemen  of  the  period, 
the  Duke  of  Chou,  and  a Prince  of  Shi,  in  which  the  duke 
prognosticates  the  stability  of  the  newly  founded  dynasty 
by  saying : ‘ — 

“ I do  not  dare  to  say  as  if  I knew  it : the  final  end  will  issue  in  our 
misfortunes.  Oh ! you  have  said,  0 prince,  it  depends  on  our- 
selves. I also  do  not  dare  to  rest  in  the  favor  of  God,  never  fore- 
casting at  a distance  the  terrors  of  Heaven  in  the  present  time  when 
there  is  no  murmuring  or  disobedience  among  the  people ; the  issue 
is  with  men.  Should  our  present  successor  to  his  fathers  prove 
‘ Legge,  p.  475. 


102 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


greatly  unable  to  reverence  Heaven  and  the  people,  and  so  bring 
to  an  end  their  glory,  could  we  in  our  families  be  ignorant  of  it  ? 
The  favor  of  Heaven  is  not  easily  preserved.  Heaven  is  hard  to  be 
depended  upon.  Men  lose  its  favoring  appointment  because  they 
cannot  pursue  and  carry  out  the  reverence  and  brilliant  virtue  of 
their  forefathers.  Now  I,  Tan,  being  but  a little  child,  am  not  able 
to  correct  our  king.  I would  simply  conduct  him  to  the  glory  of 
his  forefathers,  and  make  his  youth  partaker  of  that.  . . . Heaven 
is  not  to  be  trusted.  Our  course  is  simply  to  seek  the  prolongation 
of  the  virtue  of  the  tranquilizing  king  Wu-wang,  and  Heaven  will 
not  find  occasion  to  remove  its  favoring  decree  which  Won-wang 
received.” 

Tlie  influence  of  God  on  the  fate  of  man  is  here  brought 
into  direct  opposition  with  that  of  one’s  forefathers. 
Heaven,  or  God,  having  bestowed  favors  on  one’s  ancestors, 
it  rests  with  the  present  generation  to  shape  its  own  fate. 

WTio  were  the  real  powers  to  be  addressed  in  prayer,  and 
whose  influence  on  the  fate  of  the  living  generation  was 
thus  sought,  has  been  clearly  indicated  in  an  anecdote  told 
in  the  Shu-king}  Two  years  after  the  conquest  of  the 
Shang  dynasty,  that  is,  in  1120  b.c.,  Wu-wang  fell  ill  and 
“was  quite  disconsolate.”  Sc«ne  one  proposed  to  consult 
the  tortoise  oracle  concerning  him,  but  Chou-kung  dis- 
approved because  that  would  “distress  our  former  kings.” 
Keeping  his  powder  dry  would  not  have  availed  much  in 
saving  a dying  man.  But  it  is  characteristic  that,  instead 
of  praying  to  Heaven,  Chou-kung  addressed  the  spirits 
of  his  ancestors,  to  each  of  the  preceding  three  generations 
of  whom  he  erected  an  altar  on  which  he  deposited  the 
sacred  gem  (pf).  This  he  did  with  the  seriousness  of  a 
modern  clairvoyant  while  upholding  with  his  folded  hands, 
as  the  evidence  of  his  person  and  rank  in  appearing  before 


* Legge,  p.  351  seqq. 


FROM  WU-WANG  TO  K’ANG-WANG 


103 


those  exalted  spirits,  his  own  personal  jade  badge  {kui). 
Thus  prepared,  he  prayed  to  the  spirits  of  T’ai-wang, 
T’ai-wang’s  son  Ki,  and  Won-wang,  his  and  Wu-wang’s 
father. 

“The  grand  historian  by  his  order  wrote  on  tablets  his  prayer 
to  the  following  effect:  ‘A.  B.,  your  chief  descendant,  is  suffering 
from  a severe  and  dangerous  sickness ; — if  you  three  kings  have  in 
Heaven  the  charge  of  watching  over  him,  Heaven’s  great  son,  let 
me,  Tan,  be  a substitute  for  his  person.  I have  been  lovingly 
obedient  to  my  father;  I am  possessed  of  many  abilities  and  arts 
which  fit  me  to  serve  spiritual  beings.  Your  chief  descendant,  on 
the  other  hand,  has  not  so  many  abilities  and  arts  as  I,  and  is  not 
so  capable  of  serving  spiritual  beings.  And,  moreover,  he  was 
appointed  in  the  hall  of  God  to  extend  his  aid  to  the  four  quarters 
of  the  empire,  so  that  he  might  establish  your  descendants  in  this 
lower  world.  The  people  of  the  four  quarters  stand  in  reverent 
awe  of  him.  Oh  ! do  not  let  that  precious  Heaven-conferred  appoint- 
ment fall  to  the  ground ; and  all  our  former  kings  will  also  have  a 
perpetual  reliance  and  resort.  I will  now  seek  for  your  orders 
from  the  great  tortoise.  If  you  grant  what  I request,  I will  take 
these  symbols  and  this  mace,  and  return  and  wait  for  the  issue. 
If  you  do  not  grant  it,  I will  put  them  by.’  ” 

The  duke  then  divined  with  the  three  tortoises  and  all 
were  favorable.  He  took  a key,  opened,  and  looked  at  the 
oracular  responses,  which  were  also  favorable,  and  said; 
“According  to  the  form  of  the  prognostic  the  king  will  take 
no  injury.  I have  got  his  appointment  renewed  by  the 
three  kings.”  On  the  following  day  the  king  got  better. 

In  the  fourth  year  of  his  reign  (1119  b.c.)  a great  assembly 
of  the  princes  and  grandees  of  the  empire  took  place,  when 
they  all  did  homage  to  Wu-wang  as  their  emperor.  Wu- 
wang  died  in  1116  b.c. 


104 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


§ 23.  Ch’ong-wang  (1115-1079  B.c.) 

Wu-wang’s  son  and  heir,  Ch’ong-wang,  was  a minor 
when  he  became  emperor,  and  his  uncle,  the  Duke  of  Chou, 
had  been  appointed  his  guardian  before  Wu-wang’s  death. 
The  duke,  being  now  the  senior  of  the  family,  was  also 
appointed  regent  of  the  empire.  The  jealousy  and  in- 
trigues of  his  brothers  and  other  discontented  parties 
resulted  in  the  circulation  of  rumors  among  the  people  to 
the  effect  that  Chou-kung  intended  to  usurp  permanently 
the  supreme  power  for  himself,  and  that  his  guardianship 
over  the  young  emperor  was  merely  a pretext  leading  to 
this  end.  With  great  delicacy  of  feeling  he  met  all  these 
accusations  by  withdrawing  from  the  court  without  in- 
forming the  emperor.  But  so  great  was  his  personal  in- 
fluence among  the  people,  that  it  seemed  as  though  he 
carried  the  court  with  him,  to  judge  from  the  attention 
he  received  wherever  he  made  his  appearance.  He  re- 
mained two  years  in  his  voluntary  exile,  during  which  time 
he  is  said  to  have  occupied  himself  with  an  extension  of 
the  work  commenced  by  his  father  Won-wang,  while  in 
prison,  the  I-king,  or  “Book  of  Changes.”  He  kept,  how- 
ever, as  far  as  distance  would  permit,  a watchful  eye  on 
his  brothers,  who  were  at  the  bottom  of  the  intrigues 
against  him  and  who  had  in  the  meantime  taken  charge  of 
the  young  emperor.  It  appears  that  two  of  his  brothers, 
driven  by  personal  ambition,  had  invented  these  rumors 
for  the  special  purpose  of  getting  the  powerful  duke  out 
of  sight  so  that  they  might  accomplish  their  own  ends. 
With  the  assistance  of  Wu-kong,  the  son  of  the  last  emperor 
of  the  Shang  dynasty,  whom  Wu-wang  had  placed  in  charge 
of  Corea,  a rebellion  was  planned.  Seeing  the  danger  of 


FROM  WU-WANG  TO  K’ANG-WANG 


105 


these  plots  to  the  young  emperor,  Chou-kung  is  supposed 
to  have  written  a poem,  preserved  among  the  odes  of  the 
Shi-king,'-  a sort  of  allegory  in  which  he  represents  himself 
as  a bird  bewailing  the  attacks  made  by  owls  on  its  nest 
and  its  young  one  (that  is,  the  emperor)  sitting  in  it. 
Whether  this  ode  was  really  composed  by  Chou-kung  or 
not,  it  is  ascribed  to  him  and  is  characteristic  of  the  situa- 
tion. The  last  two  verses  read,  in  Legge’s  translation,  as 
follows : — 

“With  my  claws  I tore  and  held. 

Through  the  rushes  which  I gathered, 

And  all  the  materials  I collected, 

My  mouth  was  all  sore : — 

I said  to  myself,  I have  not  yet  got  my  house  complete. 

“ My  wings  are  all  injured ; 

My  tail  is  all  broken ; 

My  house  is  in  a perilous  condition ; 

It  is  tossed  about  in  the  wind  and  rain : — 

I can  but  cry  out  with  this  note  of  alarm.” 

The  young  emperor  had  always  silently  sided  with  Chou- 
kung.  When,  owing  to  a great  storm,  the  crops  through- 
out the  empire  had  been  destroyed,  he  searched  the 
court  records  in  order  to  find  out  what  his  predecessors 
had  done  in  the  presence  of  such  calamities.  On  this 
occasion  he  discovered  the  record  of  Chdu-kung’s  prayer 
to  his  ancestors,  in  which  the  duke  had  asked  them  to  take 
his  own  life  in  order  that  his  brother,  the  Emperor  Wu- 
wang,  might  recover.  This  moved  the  young  emperor’s 
heart.  He  was  now  convinced  that  the  great  storm  had 
been  sent  by  Heaven  as  a punishment  for  the  ill-treatment 
Chou-kung  had  received  at  his  hands.  He  recalled  the 
exile  and  reinstated  him  in  all  his  honors. 

‘ Legge,  p.  233  seq. 


106 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


His  enemies  now  broke  out  in  open  rebellion  and  took 
up  arms  under  the  pretext  of  defending  the  dynasty 
against  its  minister,  the  Duke  of  Chou,  to  the  great  delight 
of  Wu-kong,  who  was  led  to  hope  that  through  the  en- 
deavors of  the  Chou  family  to  ruin  each  other  his  own 
house  might  come  into  power  again.  The  emperor  was 
prudent  enough  to  see  through  these  designs  and  sent  an 
army  under  Chou-kung  against  the  united  forces  of  Wu- 
kong  and  his  friends.  Chou-kung  gained  a decisive  vic- 
tory and  made  Wu-kong  prisoner.  His  brothers  tendered 
their  submission;  one  of  them  was  executed  with  Wu-kong, 
the  other  being  banished.  Within  three  years  Chou-kung 
established  peace  throughout  the  empire.  After  Wu- 
kong’s  death  the  dignity  of  a prince  of  the  empire,  granted 
to  him  as  the  last  scion  of  the  Shang  dynasty,  was  trans- 
ferred to  the  late  Emperor  Chou-sin’s  stepbrother  Wei-tzi 
(or  K’i,  Baron  of  Wei),  by  which  act  of  grace  toward  a 
descendant  of  the  dynasty  headed  by  one  of  the  best 
monarchs  China  had  seen,  Ch’ong-t’ang,  the  emperor 
showed  his  appreciation  of  the  legitimacy  of  tradition. 
Wei-tzi  had  been  among  those  who  had  protested  against 
the  late  Emperor  Chou-sin’s  cruelties  and,  therefore,  deserved 
to  be  selected  as  the  one  member  of  his  family  to  be  given 
the  chance  of  continuing  the  generation  in  a prominent, 
if  not  imperial,  position.  A special  chapter  is  devoted  to 
a speech  of  Ch’ong-wang’s  on  the  occasion  of  Wei-tzi’s 
investiture  in  the  Shu-king.'-  In  appointing  him  prince 
of  Sung  the  emperor  said,  among  other  things : — 

“Reverently  and  carefully  you  discharge  your  filial  duties; 
gravely  and  respectfully  you  behave  to  spirits  and  to  men.  I 
admire  your  virtue  and  pronounce  it  great  and  not  to  be  forgotten. 

‘ Lcgge,  p.  376  seqq. 


FROM  WU-WANG  TO  K’ANG-WANG 


107 


God  will  always  enjoy  your  offerings;  the  people  will  be  reverently 
harmonious  under  your  sway.  I raise  you,  therefore,  to  the  rank 
of  High  Duke,  to  rule  this  eastern  part  of  our  great  land  [i.e.  Corea]. 

“Be  reverent.  Go  and  diffuse  abroad  your  instructions;  be 
carefully  observant  of  your  robes  and  various  other  s)unbols  of 
your  appointment ; follow  and  observe  the  proper  statutes  — so  as 
to  prove  a bulwark  to  the  royal  House.  Enlarge  the  fame  of  your 
meritorious  ancestor,  be  a law  to  your  people  ! so  as  forever  to  pre- 
serve your  dignity.  So  also  shall  you  be  a help  to  me,  the  one  man ; 
future  ages  will  enjoy  the  benefit  of  your  virtue;  all  the  states  will 
take  you  for  a pattern ! and  thus  you  will  make  our  dynasty  of 
Chou  never  weary  of  you.  Oh ! go,  and  be  prosperous.  Do  not 
disregard  my  charge.” 


§ 24.  The  “ Ch6u-li  ” 

The  reign  of  Ch’ong-wang  is  distinguished  by  what  may 
be  called  the  laying  of  the  foundations  of  a government  in 
China;  and  the  king’s  uncle,  Chou-kung,  must  be  looked 
upon  as  the  organizer  of  the  state  machinery  of  the  Chou 
dynasty.  In  the  Shu-king  two  chapters,  entitled  respec- 
tively “The  Establishment  of  Government”  and  “The 
Officers  of  Chou,”  are  specially  devoted  to  the  fundamental 
institutions  made  by  Ch’ong-wang  under  the  advice  of  the 
Duke  of  Chou.  To  Chou-kung  is  also  ascribed  the  author- 
ship of  the  Ch6u-li,  a work  in  which  the  entire  government 
apparatus  of  the  Chou  dynasty  is  described.  It  seems 
quite  possible  that  Chou-kung  may  have  outlined  such  a 
work ; but  it  is  not  likely  that  he  is  responsible  for  all  the 
details  found  in  the  present  text,  since  it  must  have  taken 
generations  of  government  life  before  opportunities  could 
have  arisen  to  place  on  record  all  the  minute  regulations 
embodied  in  this  huge  collection  of  statutes.  Opinions 
have,  therefore,  differed  a great  deal  among  the  Chinese 


108 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


themselves  as  to  the  real  authorship  of  the  work  in  ques- 
tion. It  was  the  great  expounder  of  Confucian  philosophy, 
Chu  Hi  (1130-1200  a.d.),  who  investigated  the  subject  and 
defended  the  ancient  origin  of  the  Chou-li,  claiming  that  it 
might  possibly  be  traced  back  to  Chou-kung  himself.  Even 
if  that  be  so,  it  stands  to  reason  that  a standard  work  on 
government  institutions  would  be  subject  to  a great  many 
additions  and  modifications,  called  for  by  practical  require- 
ments in  the  course  of  seven  hundred  and  fifty  years,  which 
was  the  period  that  elapsed  from  the  time  of  Chou-kung 
down  to  the  end  of  the  dynasty.  If  we  assume  that  the 
nucleus  of  the  contents  was  actually  Chou-kung’s  work, 
the  text  as  handed  down  to  posterity  seems  to  represent 
the  public  institutions  of  the  dynasty  in  their  fullest  develop- 
ment, and  as  such,  it  forms  a most  important  source  in  the 
history  of  cultural  life  during  the  Chou  period,  which  must 
be  regarded  as  a model  serving  as  a guide  to  later  genera- 
tions. As  an  educator  of  the  nation  the  Ch6u-li  has 
probably  not  its  like  among  the  literatures  of  the  world, 
not  excepting  even  the  Bible.  This  remark  refers  es- 
pecially to  its  minute  details  of  public  and  social  life,  in 
which  respect  its  influence  on  the  character  of  the  Chinese 
has  been  fully  equal  to  that  exercised  by  the  teachings  of 
Confucius  in  regard  to  morals.  Its  contents,  as  repre- 
sented in  li^douard  Biot’s  valuable  French  translation,*  throw 
considerable  light  on  the  constitution  and  culture  of  the 
nation  during  the  Chou  period. 

China  was  in  those  days  divided,  somewhat  like  Ger- 
many, into  a number  of  smaller  states,  all  of  which  recog- 
nized the  Son  of  Heaven  as  their  principal  ruler,  who 
from  the  outset  must  have  had  considerable  power  over 
* Le  Tcheou-li,  ou  rites  des  Tcheou,  2 vols.,  Paris,  185L 


FROM  WU-WANG  TO  K’ANG-WANG 


109 


the  several  feudatory  governments;  for  it  is  he  who 
establishes  states,  defines  their  limits,  and  indicates  the 
location  of  their  capitals;  through  him,  also,  their  rulers 
hold  their  appointments.  Their  government  is  to  be 
modeled  like  the  emperor’s,  and  is  to  be  controlled  and 
inspected  from  time  to  time  by  him,  he  having  the  power 
to  revoke  and  to  depose  or  reprimand  the  refractory.  The 
most  rigid  religious  ceremonial  regulates  the  daily  life  of 
emperor,  government  officers,  and  feudatory  lords.  It  is 
this  detail  in  regard  to  the  outer  forms  of  life  that  has  held 
the  Chou  organism  together  for  so  many  centuries.  There 
is  hardly  an  act  in  official,  and  even  social,  life  which  is  not 
performed  with  certain  ceremonies.  This  applies  to  the 
mode  of  dress  to  be  worn,  the  speeches  to  be  made,  and 
the  postures  to  be  assumed  on  all  possible  occasions, 
whether  at  court  or  in  private  life.  Biot  appropriately 
remarks  that  the  chief  aim  of  all  these  minute  regulations 
was  the  founding  of  a certain  immutability  of  government 
on  the  physical  and  moral  immutability  of  individuals  by 
depriving  them  as  much  as  possible  of  all  spontaneous 
action  in  public  and  private  life.  Although  catastrophes 
have  every  now  and  then  exploded  dynastic  and  social 
relations  among  the  people,  it  would  appear  that  the  tra- 
ditional veneration  in  which  their  ceremonial  has  been 
held  by  the  Chinese  ever  since  the  days  of  the  Ch6u-li  has 
had  much  to  do  with  the  stability  of  China  and  the  Chinese 
as  an  empire  and  a nation. 

Far  below  the  emperor  and  the  princes  of  the  empire 
was  the  mass  of  the  people,  placed  in  rank  and  file  accord- 
ing to  their  occupations.  The  nation  consisted  of  rulers 
and  their  assistants,  government  officers,  and  the  rest  of 
the  world,  who  were  the  working  classes.  These  latter 


no 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


were  divided  into  nine  sections  ranking  in  the  following 
order:  first,  landholders,  the  producers  of  grain;  second, 
gardeners,  who  grow  plants  and  fruit  trees;  third,  wood- 
men, occupied  with  the  products  of  the  forests  and  moun- 
tains; fourth,  livestock  holders,  raising  cattle  and  fowl; 
fifth,  artisans,  who  convert  raw  materials  into  articles  of 
daily  use;  sixth,  merchants,  both  resident  and  traveling; 
seventh,  the  wives,  who  change  silk  and  hemp  into  clothes ; 
eighth,  servants,  both  male  and  female;  ninth,  the  mis- 
cellaneous class,  who  have  no  fixed  profession,  but  change 
their  occupation  as  occasion  may  demand. 

The  agricultural  population  forming  the  first  class  hold 
their  estates  as  tenants  of  their  princes,  and  have  to  deliver 
a percentage  of  the  cereals  they  grow  proportionate  to  the 
fertility  of  the  soil.  The  latter  is  ascertained  by  special 
officers  appointed  for  the  purpose,  who  also  instruct  the 
cultivators  in  the  nature  of  the  grains  and  vegetables  best 
adapted  for  cultivation,  and  the  times  for  tilling,  sowing, 
watering,  and  harvesting.  Under  their  advice  a system  of 
irrigation  best  suited  to  the  configuration  of  the  land  is  intro- 
duced. It  is  by  government  officers  that  the  people’s  work 
connected  with  the  production  of  silk  is  supervised  in  all 
its  details.  The  inhabitants  are  treated  like  a huge  family, 
at  the  head  of  which  is  the  emperor,  their  patriarch.  The 
government  apparatus  is,  therefore,  not  confined  to  those 
who  mete  out  justice  and  collect  taxes  or  administer  what 
with  us  would  be  called  government  departments,  but  the 
officers  of  Chou  {Chdu-kimn,  which  was  the  original  title  of 
the  Ch6u-li)  comprise  inspectors,  appointed  by  the  gov- 
ernment, for  almost  any  useful  work  performed  by  the 
people. 

Nearest  the  emperor  in  power  is  the  prime  minister 


FROM  WU-WANG  TO  K'ANG-WANG 


111 


(ta-tsai),  who  has  general  charge  of  the  six  divisions  of 
government.  This  division  of  all  official  business  into  six 
categories,  as  described  in  the  Ch6u-li,  has  become  the 
prototype  of  the  six  boards  of  government  {livr'pu)  of  later 
dynasties,  and  the  corresponding  divisions  made  in  the 
administrative  offices  down  to  our  own  days.  The  six 
ministries,  or  boards,  are  but  slightly  different.  At  the 
head  of  them  is  the  “Board  of  Heaven,”  or  the  “Mandarin 
of  Heaven”  (fien-kuan).  Its  chief  is  identical  with  the 
prime  minister.  This  highest  board  has,  therefore,  a 
general  supervision  over  all  government  affairs,  as  having 
control  of  the  appointment  of  officers.  It  is  the  origin  of 
the  board  which  later  on  was  called,  as  it  is  known  to-day, 
the  li*-pu,  or  “Board  of  Civil  Office.”  The  president  of 
this  board  (li*-pu-shang-shu)  has  always  had  precedence 
over  his  colleagues  of  the  other  boards;  and  the  minister 
presiding  over  the  Board  of  Civil  Office  has  at  all  times  been 
known,  as  he  is  to-day,  as  t'ien-kuan,“  Heaven’s  Mandarin,” 
the  chief  assistant  of  t'ien-tzi,  the  “Son  of  Heaven,”  that  is, 
the  emperor.  ‘ Foreign  affairs  had  up  to  this  time  been 
relegated  to  the  background  among  the  Chinese  adminis- 
trative divisions.  The  old  tsung-li-yamen  was  merely  a 
commission  which  the  Chinese  would  never  admit  to  be  a 

* This  has  been  so  for  the  last  three  thousand  years ; and  it  was 
not  until  quite  recently  that,  under  the  pressure  of  negotiations  with 
foreign  powers,  the  head  of  a newly  created  board,  the  Wai-wu- 
pu,  or  “Board  of  Foreign  Aflfairs,”  was  assigned  a rank  above  all 
the  presidents  of  the  other  boards.  The  creation  of  a seventh  board, 
in  addition  to  the  time-honored  six,  is  a thing  which  would  have  been 
impossible  in  conservative  China  previous  to  the  era  of  reforms,  ini- 
tiated by  the  Emperor  Kuang-sii  in  1898  and  forced  upon  the  recal- 
citrant conservatives  under  foreign  pressure  after  the  troubles  in 
1900.  This  change  of  rank  was  notified  to  the  empire  in  an  imperial 
edict  dated  July  24,  1901.  * See  note  on  p.  113. 


112 


THE  ANCIEiNT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


board,  chiefly  because  statesmen  of  three  thousand  years 
ago  had  made  their  arrangements,  never  thinking  that  the 
relations  with  foreign  nations  would  be  sufficiently  impor- 
tant to  justify  the  existence  of  a special  ministry.  Chinese 
national  ambition  has,  ever  since  the  constitutional  ar- 
rangements of  public  life  were  made,  looked  upon  the  em- 
peror as  the  person  who  rules  the  entire  world  by  the 
decree  of  Heaven.  Tire  “world”  was  China,  in  which  sense 
she  is  called  t'ien-hia,  that  is,  “all  that  is  under  heaven.” 
Foreign  nations  were  regarded  as  mere  boimdary  tribes  in 
a state  of  rebellion  against  the  emperor,  their  lavdul  ruler; 
and  if  they  sent  embassies  with  gifts  of  courtesy  to  the 
Chinese  court,  such  gifts  were  styled  “tribute”  (kung). 
During  the  Chou  dynasty  down  to  that  of  the  western 
Han,  when  China  led  an  isolated  life  in  the  Far  East,  long 
before  the  existence  of  other  great  countries  like  India, 
and  the  great  monarchies  of  western  Asia  and  the  Roman 
empire,  became  known  to  them,  this  view  was  not  without 
good  foundation,  since  China  was  then  actually  the  only 
civilized  country,  towering  high  above  a host  of  barbarous 
tribes  surrounding  it.  During  this  long  period  of  undis- 
puted superiority  over  her  neighbors,  that  characteristic 
national  megalomania,  of  which  she  finds  it  so  difficult  to 
rid  herself  even  at  the  present  day,  had  a thousand  years 
to  develop  and  to  take  firm  root  in  the  heart  of  the  nation. 
The  Chinese  would  never  have  dared  to  make  a change  in 
those  sacred  institutions,  said  to  have  been  first  placed  on 
record  by  the  Duke  of  Chou,  but  for  circumstances  over 
which  they  had  no  control. 

The  six  departments  of  government  as  described  in  the 
Ch6u-li  were  the  following : (1)  “ Tlie  Mandarin  of  Heaven,” 
(t’ien-kvan) , who  had  general  control  over  all  the  other 


FROM  WU-WANG  TO  K’ANG-WANG 


113 


departments.  His  office  corresponded  to  the  modern 
or  " Board  of  Civil  Office.”  (2)  “ The  Mandarin  of 
Earth”  iti-kuan),  charged  with  the  instruction  of  the 
people,  primarily  in  agriculture  (nong),  that  being  the 
chief  source  of  national  wealth  and  consequently  of  govern- 
ment revenue.  It  is  from  this  point  of  view  that  we  have 
to  explain  its  gradual  change  into  what  is  now  called 
hu-pu,  the  “People’s  Board,”  or  “Board  of  Revenue.” 
(3)  “The  Mandarin  of  Spring”  {ch' un-kuan) , who  was  in 
charge  of  the  state  ceremonial  and  whose  office  corresponded 
to  the  modern  li^-pu,^  or  “ Board  of  Ceremonies.”  (4)  “ The 
Mandarin  of  Summer”  {hia-kican),  who  exercised  executive 
power,  and  is  now  represented  by  the  “Board  of  War” 
{ping-pu).  (5)  “The  Mandarin  of  Autumn”  (ts'iu-kuan) , in 
charge  of  punishments,  represented  by  the  present  “ Board 
of  Justice”  (hing-pu),  and  finally,  (6)  “The  Mandarin  of 
Winter”  (tung-kuan) , who  was  in  charge  of  public  works 
and  corresponded  to  the  modern  kunq-pu,  or  “Board  of 
Works.” 

These  six  categories  have  down  to  the  present  day  been 
the  basis  of  all  division  of  official  work,  and  the  yamen,  or 
government  offices,  throughout  the  empire  imitate  metro- 
politan arrangements  by  classifying  business  in  separate 
departments,  secretariats,  desks,  or  pigeonholes,  large  or 
small,  as  the  range  of  their  jurisdiction  may  be,  under  the 
six  heads  of  “Personal,”  “Revenue,”  “Ceremonies,” 
“Military,”  “Judicial,”  and  “Works.” 

The  Mandarin  of  Heaven  performed,  as  it  were,  the  func- 
tions of  a prime  minister,  having  joint  responsibility  for  the 

* Note  that  the  first  syllable  in  li*-pu  and  W-pu,  as  indicated  by 
numbers,  is  pronounced  in  different  tones  in  the  two  words  and  in 
Chinese  is  written  with  different  characters. 


114 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


five  other  boards.  It  was  he  who  fixed  the  amounts  to  be 
levied  under  the  heads  of  dues,  local  tribute,  and  taxes  of 
all  kinds,  which  constituted  the  imperial  revenue ; he  regu- 
lated the  public  expenses;  the  entire  inner  and  outer  gov- 
ernment service,  both  civil  and  military,  was  under  his 
juri.sdiction;  so  also  was  the  management  of  the  several 
imperial  households,  those  of  the  emperor  himself,  of  the 
empress,  of  the  crown  prince,  and  of  the  imperial  concubines. 
The  great  number  of  the  last  named  had  even  in  those  early 
days  led  to  the  employment,  in  personal  attendance  on  the 
imperial  ladies,  of  a special  class  of  court  officials — those 
pests  of  Oriental  court  life,  the  eunuchs.  This  feature  of 
the  constitution  of  the  Chou  dynasty  forms  a strange  con- 
trast to  the  moral  purity  which  otherwise  characterizes 
the  early  social  life  of  the  Chinese.  Eunuchism  has  proved 
a curse  to  public  life  in  China  at  all  times;  and  many  a 
catastrophe  must  be  ascribed  to  its  intrigues  which  have 
rai.sed  unworthy  men  to  high  positions  and  worked  much 
harm  in  an  underhand  manner.  It  appears  that  the  early 
legislators  of  the  Chou  dynasty  cannot  be  held  responsible 
for  such  a degeneration  of  court  life  as  that,  for  instance,  of 
the  Ming  dynasty,  whose  downfall  is  ascribed  to  the  in- 
famous power  attained  by  the  court  eunuchs  as  a class. 
Under  the  Chou  rule  these  were  merely  servants  and  in 
no  way  connected  with  administrative  or  political  duties. 

The  imperial  palace  consisted  of  a vast  inclosure  sur- 
rounded by  high  mud  or  brick  walls,  in  which  were  the 
following:  the  dwelling-houses  of  the  emperor,  the  empress, 
the  concubines,  and  their  servants ; the  offices  of  the  minis- 
ters, reception  halls,  and  temples ; shops  for  weaving  silk 
and  hemp  for  the  use  of  the  coirrt ; treasuries  for  the  preser- 
vation of  the  imperial  archives,  historical  documents, 


FROM  Wnj-WANG  TO  K’ANG-WANG 


115 


jewelry,  and  other  precious  belongings  of  the  state  or  the 
emperor;  depositories  for  stores  and  all  that  was  necessary 
for  the  maintenance  of  life.  In  other  words,  it  was  a walled 
city  within  the  capital  city  reserved  for  the  emperor,  his 
household,  and  his  government;  and  the  monarch  seldom 
left  it  except  in  his  official  capacity.  The  emperor’s  per- 
sonal life  was  regulated  by  strict  ceremonial  in  its  most 
minute  details,  in  which  respect  the  most  powerful  man 
among  millions  was  less  free  than  any  of  his  subjects.  His 
mode  of  dress,  the  work  he  had  to  do  during  every  hour 
of  the  day,  the  postures  he  had  to  assume  in  performing 
certain  ceremonies,  and  the  words  he  had  to  pronounce  on 
every  possible  occasion  were  regulated  by  that  cruel  tyrant, 
state  ceremonial.  Even  his  daily  meals,  the  natme  and 
the  quantity  of  food  to  be  served  to  him  at  each  season  of 
the  year  and  on  special  occasions  were  subject  to  fixed  rules. 
He  was  supposed  to  starve  himself  when  famine  prevailed 
in  the  country  or  in  times  of  public  calamity.  His  meals 
were  not  presented  to  him  by  state  dignitaries  or  by  eunuchs, 
who  might  flatter  his  senses  in  order  to  curry  favor,  but  by 
a court  attendant  who  had  to  taste  them  in  his  presence. 
The  same  rigid  ceremonial  was  brought  to  bear  on  the  feuda- 
tory princes. 

Since  the  broad  masses  of  the  people  were  not  supposed 
to  know  how  to  behave  in  the  various  conditions  of  life, 
the  second  among  the  administrative  divisions,  that  of 
instruction,  headed  by  the  Mandarin  of  Earth,  had  to  take 
precautions  for  their  welfare.  The  mandarin’s  jurisdiction 
extended  to  all  relations  in  life:  the  occupations  of  the 
people,  their  trade,  civil  services,  religious  duties,  family 
matters,  etc.  The  ordinary  subject  was,  even  in  his  private 
life,  under  government  control.  Thus  a special  mandarin 


116 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


was  in  charge  of  marriages.  He  had  to  see  that  no  man  re- 
mained unmarried  after  the  age  of  thirty,  girls  being  sub- 
ject to  marriage  at  twenty.  The  chief  duty  of  this  depart- 
ment was  the  levying  of  taxes  in  accordance  with  a budget 
drawn  up  by  the  prime  minister.  The  Mandarin  of  Earth 
acted  also  as  a kind  of  justice  of  the  peace.  Thousands  of 
little  rules  had  been  made  to  prevent  disorders  of  any  kind ; 
and  in  order  to  see  that  they  were  duly  observed  both  by 
the  government  agents  charged  with  their  execution  and 
the  people  who  had  to  obey  them  there  were  officers  who 
had  to  watch  public  life  and  denounce  any  irregularity 
occurring.  All  these  measures  were  calculated  to  main- 
tain the  nation  in  a state  of  general  goodness ; and  lest  the 
government  itself  should  fail  in  its  sacred  duties,  there  were 
the  pavrshl,  an  officer  endowed  with  power  to  reprimand 
the  emperor  himself  if  he  was  at  fault ; the  ssi-shl,  who  had 
to  instruct  the  emperor  and  the  sons  of  the  empire  {kuo- 
tzi),  i.e.  the  elder  sons  of  high  officials,  in  all  that  is  good 
and  virtuous;  and  the  ssi-kien,  or  public  remonstrator, 
who  was  expected  to  mix  with  the  people  in  order  to  study 
their  lives,  correct  their  faults,  and  report  on  any  evils  he 
might  discover.  These  officers,  dependent  on  the  Mandarin 
of  Earth,  may  be  said  to  have  performed  the  functions  of 
preachers,  though  their  duties  had  nothing  to  do  with  re- 
ligion, but  merely  with  morality,  virtue,  and  goodness, 
pure  and  simple.  Their  subordination  to  a higher  board 
seems  to  indicate  that  they  had  not  the  political  influence 
exercised  later  on  by  the  institute  of  Public  Censors 
{yu-shi),  which  was  not  developed  before  the  Ts’in  and 
Han  dynasties. 

To  what  degree  the  government  solicitude  for  the  life 
of  the  people  went  into  detail,  may  be  seen  from  the  fact 


FROM  WU-WANG  TO  K’ANG-WANG 


117 


that  eight  out  of  the  forty-four  books  in  the  great  code  of 
the  Chou  dynasty  are  devoted  to  the  functions  of  the 
Mandarin  of  Earth  and  his  subordinate  officers.  One  of 
these  was  charged  with  the  duty  of  making  tours  of  inspec- 
tion in  order  to  ascertain  the  merits  of  individuals  qualify- 
ing them  for  office ; for,  with  the  exception  of  the  emperor, 
his  princes,  and  the  several  feudal  lords,  the  incumbents  of 
all,  even  the  highest,  government  officials  were  selected 
from  among  the  people.  Merely  the  eldest  sons  of  the 
higher  officials  enjoyed  certain  privileges  under  the  name 
“Sons  of  the  Empire”  (kuo-tzi),  inasmuch  as  they  were 
given  the  chance  of  a higher  education  under  a special 
officer.  They  had  their  special  uniforms  and  were  admitted 
to  court  ceremonies  as  pages. 

Exceptions  were  also  made  with  regard  to  heredity  of 
office  in  cases  where  certain  qualifications,  required  for  its 
duties,  were  likely  to  be  confined  to  certain  families  and 
had  become  traditional,  having  been  transmitted  from 
generation  to  generation,  such  as  the  practice  of  certain 
arts  which  were  treated  as  family  secrets.  It  is  a feature 
of  Chinese  social  life  that  specialties  in  art  and  workman- 
ship are  treated  as  the  monopoly  of  certain  families  on 
which  no  outsider  is  allowed  to  trespass.  Such  was  the 
case  under  the  Han  dynasty  with  certain  patterns  of  silk 
brocade.  Many  trades,  such  as  the  superior  lacquer  in- 
dustry in  Foochow  and  the  manufacture  of  bronze  drums 
in  Canton,  have  been  family  secrets;  and  these  secrets  are 
so  well  guarded  that  a branch  of  art  may  die  out  with  the 
last  scion  of  the  family  that  created  it,  as  in  the  case  of  the 
celebrated  Foochow  lacquer,  the  secret  of  which  was  lost 
during  the  T’ai-p’ing  rebellion. 

The  Mandarin  of  Spring,  who  was  in  charge  of  religious 


118 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


ceremonies,  was  a characteristic  creation  of  the  Chinese 
nation.  If,  as  we  have  seen,  the  emperor  addressed  himself 
to  God,  or  Heaven,  as  the  supreme  ruler,  his  subjects  sacri- 
ficed to  beings  of  a lower  order:  sun,  moon,  and  stars, 
hills,  rivers,  and  forests,  and  last,  not  least,  the  departed 
souls  of  their  ancestors.  The  manner  in  which  sacrifice 
was  to  be  brought  was  regulated  by  thousands  of  petty 
rules.  In  recording  such  rules  the  Ch6u-li  places  us  in  a 
position  to  form  an  idea  of  the  spiritual  life  of  the  people, 
which  was  full  of  superstition.  The  art  of  obtaining  an 
omen  from  the  unseen  spirits  was  cultivated  in  every  pos- 
sible detail.  The  chief  means  of  auguration  was,  of  course, 
the  time-honored  system  of  Pa-kua,  as  explained  in  Won- 
wang’s  I-king.  In  many  cases  the  scales  of  the  tortoise 
scorched  by  fire  were  used  as  oracles.  The  fissures  thus 
created  on  the  surface  of  a scale  were  of  great  variety;  and 
a regular  system  had  been  invented  for  the  interpretation 
of  what  may  be  called  tortoise  palmistry.  There  were 
scientists  for  the  interpretation  of  dreams,  and  sorcerers, 
male  and  female,  who  could  bring  on  fine  weather  or  rain. 
Observation  of  the  stars  was,  of  course,  a great  means  of 
ascertaining  man’s  fate.  The  position  of  court  astronomer, 
with  functions  distinct  from  those  of  the  astrological  ex- 
perts, was  hereditary.  The  astronomer  did  good  work  in 
connection  with  the  calendar,  and  what  we  learn  in  the 
Ch6u-li  about  his  duties  betokens  an  advanced  state  of 
scientific  development.  Tlie  astrologer  held  a different 
office  from  that  of  his  colleague  just  mentioned.  The 
latter  had  to  watch  the  position  and  movements  of  the 
heavenly  bodies;  the  astrologer  was  required  to  interpret 
their  forebodings,  since  numbers  of  ceremonies  were  con- 
nected with  the  seasons.  Both  of  these  officers  were  of 


FROM  WU-WANG  TO  K’ANG-WANG 


119 


great  importance  in  connection  with  the  Board  of  Cere- 
monies. The  astronomers  of  the  Chou  dynasty  were 
familiar  with  the  use  of  the  gnomon;  and  their  observa- 
tions, which  have  been  checked  by  European  savants,  have 
proved  correct. 

The  fom-th  of  the  six  boards,  represented  by  the  Mandarin 
of  Summer,  corresponded  to  the  present  Board  of  War. 
The  Chinese  in  those  days  had  no  standing  army,  but  when 
soldiers  were  required  for  the  purpose  of  fighting  external 
enemies,  suppressing  rebellions,  or  assisting  in  the  em- 
peror’s hunting  expeditions,  the  necessary  numbers  were 
enlisted.  The  Mandarin  of  Earth  in  charge  of  the  Peoples’ 
Board  made  the  levies;  and  his  subordinates  placed  them 
at  the  disposition  of  the  Mandarin  of  Summer,  who  was  a 
kind  of  commander-in-chief  of  the  empire.  Minute  in- 
structions were  issued  in  connection  with  the  levy  of  troops ; 
the  number  of  able-bodied  men  each  family  had  to  keep  in 
readiness  was  prescribed  by  law,  and  for  this  purpose 
a general  census  was  taken  of  the  entire  population  once 
every  three  years,  when  males  and  females,  adults  and 
children,  were  distinguished  and  note  was  taken  of  domestic 
animals  and  of  tools  used  for  work.  Statistics  had  de- 
veloped into  a regular  science  even  in  those  early  days. 
How  the  statistical  method  was  made  use  of  for  govern- 
ment purposes,  apart  from  the  levy  of  troops,  will  be  shown 
later  on  by  the  work  of  the  philosopher  Kuan-tzi,  who 
died  646  b.c.  The  levying  of  troops  thus  laid  the  founda- 
tion of  vital  statistics  as  a science,  and  it  also  became  a 
great  stimulus  in  improving  the  records  of  the  geographical 
condition  of  the  empire,  which  was  then  divided  into 
nine  provinces.  Of  these  maps  were  made  showing  their 
principal  rivers,  lakes,  and  mountains,  their  products  and 


120 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


articles  of  trade,  and  other  useful  details.  The  China  of 
those  times  was,  of  course,  not  the  big  empire  it  is  to-day. 
Her  dominions  were  then  confined  to  the  northern  part  of 
the  present  “Eighteen  Provinces.”  At  the  beginning  of 
the  Chou  dynasty  the  Tartar  nations  in  the  northeast,  the 
precursors  of  the  Huns,  constantly  encroached  upon  what 
later  on  became  undisputed  Chinese  territory;  and  the 
nation  did  not  feel  much  tempted  to  extend  toward  the 
south  and  southwest  which  were  then  held  by  unculti- 
vated Man  barbarians.  On  the  east  the  sea  was  still  the 
most  satisfactory  boundary,  since  no  foreign  fleets  threat- 
ened the  peace  of  the  empire  from  that  direction. 

The  most  distant  province  and  the  first  one  described 
in  the  Ch6u-li  was  Yang-chou,  occupying  the  coast  terri- 
tories near  the  mouth  of  the  Yang-tzi  River  south  and 
north  of  it.  The  term  Yang-ch6u,  as  denoting  the  southern 
margravate  of  the  empire,  has  been  very  elastic  in  the 
course  of  history.  Some  Chinese  authors  make  it  cover 
the  entire  south  of  China,  as  far  as  imperial  authority  went, 
during  the  several  periods  of  history ; others,  more  critical, 
distinctly  exclude  from  the  Yang-chou  of  the  Chou  dynasty 
those  territories  in  the  south  which  are  screened  off  by 
the  Nan-ling  range.  The  name  Yang-chou  has  survived 
in  that  of  the  city  so  called  and  possibly  in  that  of  the  river 
Yang-tzi,  the  etymology  of  this  latter  name  being  uncertain. 
Tliis  province  was  irrigated  by  the  lower  Yang-tzi,  with  its 
affluents,  and  the  T’ai-wu  Lake,  and  its  trade  consisted  in 
metals,  tin,  and  bamboos.  The  Ch6u-li  says  of  its  popula- 
tion that  there  were  five  men  to  every  two  women,  and  that 
the  cultivation  of  rice  formed  their  principal  occupation. 
Every  province  had  its  sacred  mountain.  That  of  Yang- 
chou  was  called  Kui-ki  (Hui-ki). 


FROM  WU-WANG  TO  K’ANG-WANG 


121 


The  second  province  described  in  the  Ch6u-li  is  King- 
chou,  comprising  those  fertile  territories  on  the  banks  of 
the  middle  course  of  the  great  river.  Its  name  has  sur- 
vived in  that  of  the  city  of  King-chou-fu,  near  the  present 
treaty  port  of  Shasi.  Since  Mt.  Hong  is  mentioned  as  its 
sacred  hill,  its  territories  must  have  extended  far  south- 
ward into  the  province  of  Hu-nan.  Hu-nan  and  Hu-pei 
may  be  said  to  cover  the  territory  of  the  ancient  King- 
chou.  The  Chou-li  states  that  its  trade  consisted  of 
vermilion  (cinnabar),  ivory,  and  skins.  The  word  used 
in  the  Ch6u-li  for  ivory  is  c/i’i, which  means  a ‘'front  tooth,” 
pure  and  simple;  but  the  commentaries  give  it  the  sense 
of  “elephants’  teeth.”  Although  the  elephant  is  now  quite 
extinct  in  these  regions,  local  records  contain  quite  a num- 
ber of  traditions  to  the  effect  that  the  animal  was  to  be 
found  among  the  fauna  of  the  barbarian  districts  in  this 
neighborhood  in  ancient  times.  One  of  the  local  legends 
mentions  that  an  elephant  was  seen  there  as  late  as  the 
seventh  century  of  the  present  era  {Hu-nan-jang-wu-dii, 
ch.  viii,  p.  9).  In  its  population  females  predominated, 
the  proportion  being  two  women  to  one  man. 

The  province  adjoining  King-chou  in  the  north  and 
reaching  as  far  as  the  south  banks  of  the  Yellow  River  was 
Yii-chou.  Its  tutelary  hill  was  Mt.  Hua,  and  its  trade 
consisted  in  bamboos,  varnish,  silk,  and  hemp.  The  pro- 
portion of  the  sexes  was  three  women  to  two  men. 

A territory  occupying  the  present  Shan-tung  was  called 
Ts’ing-chou,  with  Mt.  I as  its  sacred  hill.  Its  trade  was 
in  rushes  and  fish.  As  regards  the  population  the  sexes 
were  equally  divided.  Fowls  and  dogs  are  mentioned  as 
the  principal  animals,  showing  that  the  country  was  well 
settled,  and  rice  and  grain  thrived  in  the  fields. 


122 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


North  of  Ts’ing-chou,  occupying  the  northern  part  of  the 
present  Shan-tung,  was  the  province  of  Yen-chou,  with  the 
celebrated  Mt.  T’ai  as  its  sacred  hill.  It  was  situated  on 
the  banks  of  the  Yellow  River,  which  then  ran  into  the 
Gulf  of  Chi-li  as  nowadays.  Men  and  women  were  in  the 
proportion  of  two  to  three  respectively. 

The  extreme  west,  the  country  south  of  the  Ordos  ter- 
ritory, with  Mt.  Yo  as  its  sacred  hill,  was  called  Yung-chou. 
It  was  bounded  by  the  river  Wei  on  the  south,  and  its 
trade  consisted  of  jade  and  other  minerals.  The  male  sex 
predominated  to  the  extent  of  five  men  to  three  women. 
Oxen  and  horses  were  the  principal  animals,  and  certain 
kinds  of  millet  were  grown. 

That  part  of  the  present  province  of  Chi-li  which  faces 
the  sea-coast  was  called  Yu-chou.  Its  sacred  hill  was  Mt. 
I-wu-lii,  situated  in  the  present  province  of  Shong-king. 
Fish  and  salt  were  its  chief  products,  and  the  proportion 
of  females  to  males  was  three  to  one. 

The  southern  part  of  Shan-si  was  occupied  by  the  province 
of  Ki-chou.  Its  sacred  hill  was  called  Ho.  The  trade 
of  the  district  was  in  pines  and  cypresses;  the  male  sex 
prevailed  in  the  proportion  of  five  to  three;  horses  and 
oxen  were  the  chief  animals ; and  millet  was  grown. 

The  northernmost  province,  Ping-chou,  occupied  the 
north  of  Shan-si,  with  the  celebrated  Mt.  Hong  as  its  sacred 
hill.  Its  products  were  cotton  and  silk  textures.  Ping- 
chou  and  Yung-chou  were  the  two  frontier  provinces  which 
came  most  into  contact  with  the  nomad  tribes  of  the 
northern  steppe,  and  most  of  the  great  battle-fields  com- 
memorating that  endless  contest  between  the  Chinese  race 
and  its  northern  neighbors  lie  within  their  boundaries. 

The  geography  of  the  Ch6u-li  bears  a remarkable  resem- 


FROM  WU-WANG  TO  K'ANG-WANG 


123 


blance  to  that  of  the  Yu-kung,  though  differences  in  de- 
tail can  be  traced.  What  we  learn  of  China  during  the 
Shang  dynasty  appears  quite  different  from  either,  and  it 
would  seem  that  the  conjecture  that  Yii’s  nine  provinces 
are  a reconstruction  of  the  philosophers  of  the  Chou  dynasty, 
is  supported  by  this  consideration.  Scanty  though  it  is, 
the  geographical  section  of  the  Ch6u-li  gives  us  an  idea  of 
the  extent  of  China  during  the  early  part  of  that  period. 
The  care  with  which  the  proportions  of  the  sexes  in  the 
several  provinces  is  placed  on  record  shows  that  no  little 
attention  was  paid  to  vital  statistics,  which  is  quite  in 
accord  with  the  lessons  given  to  his  prince  by  the  philosopher 
Kuan-tzi. 

The  fifth  great  governmental  division  was  the  Board  of 
Justice,  presided  over  by  the  Mandarin  of  Autumn,  who  was 
supposed  to  be  “in  charge  of  the  brigands.”  He  and  his 
subordinates  had  to  mete  out  justice  in  criminal  cases. 
The  penal  code  of  the  Chou  dynasty  represents  a system 
full  of  detail  which  may  be  called  humane  when  compared 
with  other  Asiatic  systems.  Before  capital  punishment 
could  be  pronounced  on  a criminal,  the  most  minute  and 
rigid  rules  had  to  be  observed ; appeals  were  made  first  to 
a board  of  high  officers,  then  to  a commission  composed  of 
officers  of  lower  rank,  and  lastly  to  the  people  themselves; 
and  it  appears  that  the  people’s  verdict  was  final,  some- 
what like  that  of  the  juries  of  modem  civilized  nations,  the 
sovereign  alone  having  the  right  to  pardon.  The  people 
were  also  consulted  in  cases  of  punishment  for  minor 
offenses.  All  subjects  were  equal  before  the  law;  but 
members  of  the  imperial  house  and  the  administrative 
officers  enjoyed  the  privilege  of  being  punished  behind  the 
scenes,  as  it  were,  so  that  the  dignity  of  their  positions 


124 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


might  be  maintained.  The  people  had  also  to  deliberate 
and  decide  under  the  authority  of  government  justices 
what  was  to  be  done  in  the  case  of  invasion  of  the  country 
by  an  enemy ; or,  when  a part  of  the  population  had  to  be 
transferred  to  another  province,  owing  to  a failure  of  the 
means  of  subsistence  in  their  original  homes ; also,  when  a 
new  king  had  to  be  elected,  there  being  no  heir  to  the 
throne, — in  brief,  we  find  traces  of  parliamentary  power. 

Certain  officials  subordinate  to  the  Mandarin  of  Autumn 
were,  conjointly  with  the  delegates  of  the  Board  of  Cere- 
monies, charged  with  the  responsibility  of  legalizing  state 
contracts,  such  as  the  agreements  made  between  the  em- 
peror and  his  feudatory  princes,  or  between  the  latter 
themselves.  Other  officials  had  to  superintend  the  cere- 
monial connected  with  contracts  among  the  people,  the 
main  feature  of  which  was  an  oath  in  which  the  blood  of  an 
animal  sacrifice  was  an  important  factor.  Also  subordinate 
to  this  board  was  the  official  called  ta-hing-jon,  the  “Great 
Traveler,”  as  Biot  translates,  the  chief  authority  in  charge 
of  ambassadorial  matters,  who,  together  with  his  staff, 
performed  functions  somewhat  resembling  those  of  a foreign 
office.  He  was  in  charge  of  the  ceremonial  connected  with 
the  reception  of  visitors  to  the  court,  whether  from  the 
feudatory  states  or  from  abroad.  The  most  minute  details 
regarding  these  court  receptions  have  been  placed  on  record 
in  the  Ch6u-li.  The  “Great  Traveler”  and  his  junior  col- 
league, the  “Small  Traveler”  (siau-hing-jon)  were,  more- 
over, charged  with  police  duties,  inasmuch  as  their  sub- 
ordinates had  to  inspect  the  condition  of  the  feudatory 
states  and  their  population.  They  had  to  keep  the  em- 
peror informed  of  all  that  was  going  on  within  his  dominions. 
The  emperor  himself  traveled  through  his  dominions  to  see 


FROM  WU-WANG  TO  K’ANG-WANG 


125 


for  himself  where  his  authority  was  called  upon  to  inter- 
fere. In  his  journeys  through  the  empire,  he  was  accom- 
panied by  an  official  provided  with  charts  of  his  provinces, 
which  gave  him  the  information  he  desired  in  connection 
with  the  countries  he  visited.  Another  officer  had  to  keep 
himseK  posted  on  historical,  social,  and  economical  ques- 
tions concerning  the  localities  visited. 

/The  Great  Traveler  also  convened  periodical  meetings 
OT  the  court  interpreters,  the  musicians,  and  the  official 
historians.  The  Interpreters  (siang-su)  had  to  be  familiar 
with  the  languages  of  the  surrounding  nations  and  to  assist 
at  the  court  receptions;  the  musicians  are  called  ku,  “blind,” 
because  the  performers  on  the  various  musical  instruments 
and  the  singers  at  court  were  selected  from  blind  men. 
The  court  historians  are  represented  by  a large  and  com- 
plicated staff  of  officials,  one  of  whom,  the  siau-shl,  or 
“Small  Historian,”  was  in  charge  of  the  documents  con- 
taining the  material  for  the  history  of  the  states  of  the 
empire,  whereas  another,  the  wai-shi,  the  “ Historian  of  the 
Exterior,”  was  charged,  among  other  duties,  with  the  record 
of  the  history  of  foreign  nations  as  well  as  of  that  of  the 
Three  Emperors  and  the  Five  Rulers  (san-huang-wu-ti) . 
It  is  probably  one  of  these  officials  who,  on  higher  inspi- 
ration, is  responsible  for  the  fabrications  placed  on  record 
in  connection  with  the  fabulous  Fu-hi,  Shon-nung,  and 
Huang-ti,  the  fine  speeches  of  Yau  and  Shun,  and  the 
engineering  exploits  of  the  great  Yii. 

The  sixth  great  board  was  that  of  Public  Works.  The 
section  of  the  Chou-li  describing  the  organization  of  this 
department  is  lost  and  has  been  replaced  imder  the 
Han  dynasty  by  a work  called  Tung-kuan-k’au-kung-ki, 
“ Records  of  the  Public  Works  of  the  Mandarin  of  Winter,” 


126 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


or  Ss'i-kung,  “Superintendent  of  Works.”  We  learn  from  it 
nothing  about  the  administrative  functions  of  this  important 
division  of  government  life;  but  the  work  contains  an 
enormous  mass  of  detail  concerning  the  arts  and  industries 
of  the  period,  of  which  so  few  remnants  have  come  down 
to  later  generations.  Thus  most  valuable  facts  are  re- 
corded with  regard  to  the  manufacture  of  bronze  imple- 
ments and  vessels.  Bells,  tripods,  and  other  sacrificial 
objects  contained  one-sixth  part  of  tin  in  an  alloy  of  cop- 
per; hatchets  of  all  sizes  contained  one-fifth;  lances  and 
spears,  one-fourth;  knives  and  swords,  one-third;  erasing 
knives  and  arrow-heads,  one-fifth,  and  metallic  mirrors,  one- 
half.  All  the  important  objects  of  art  and  productions  of 
handicrafts  are  fully  described  in  this  interesting  chapter, 
which  is  quoted  by  the  historians  of  Chinese  culture  in 
connection  with  the  origin  of  quite  a host  of  characteristic 
products  of  Chinese  civilization. 

Such  as  it  is,  the  Ch6u-li  is  a mine  of  information  on  the 
culture  of  the  Chou  period,  which  has  in  many  respects 
become  the  prototype  of  later  institutions.  The  very  few 
facts  I have  extracted  from  it  are  but  a poor  substitute  for 
the  work  itself,  for  more  detailed  information  as  to  which 
the  reader  is  referred  to  Biot’s  French  version.  It  should 
be  remarked  that  the  style  of  the  work  is  often  so  terse  and 
ambiguous  that  a comprehension  of  it,  as  of  the  other 
Chinese  classics,  is  in  many  cases  impossible  without  the 
aid  of  later  Chinese  commentaries. 

§ 25.  Origin  of  the  Mariner’s  Compass  in  China 

The  reign  of  Ch’ong-wang  (1 1 15-1079  b.c.)  has  been 
quoted  by  Chinese  and  foreign  authors  alike  as  the  period 


FROM  WU-WANG  TO  K’ANG-WANG 


127 


during  which  the  north-,  or  as  the  Chinese  say,  south- 
pointing qualities  of  the  magnetic  needle  were  discovered. 
In  the  sixth  year  of  his  reign,  so  the  legend  runs,  Ch’ong- 
wang  received  the  news  that  the  ambassadors  of  a distant 
foreign  kingdom,  called  the  tribes  of  Yiie-ch’ang,  had  ar- 
rived with  presents  to  do  him  homage.  They  had  come 
from  the  south  of  the  country  of  Kiau-chi,  i.e.  the  present 
Tungking.  Later  Chinese  historians  placed  them  at  the 
very  spot  where,  during  centuries  at  the  beginning  of  our 
era,  the  embassies  from  India  (T’ien-chu)  and  Syria  {Ta- 
ts’in)  disembarked,  in  order  to  be  conveyed  to  the  Chinese 
court,  and  where,  according  to  the  Shui-king-chu,  a geo- 
graphical record  of  the  fifth  century  a.d.,  ships  used  to 
start  for  the  journey  south  to  the  countries  of  the  Malayan 
Peninsula.  This  place  clearly  marks  what  may  be  called 
the  terminus  of  Western  navigation  as  described  on  the 
Chinese  side,  which  is  probably  identical  with  Ptolemy’s 
city  of  Cattigara,  the  terminus  of  shipping  enterprise  in  the 
Far  East  according  to  Western  classical  authors.  The 
emperor  gave  orders  that  the  Yiie-ch’ang  ambassadors 
should  be  conducted  to  the  court  and  that  great  honor 
should  be  paid  them.  The  ambassadors,  who  were  accom- 
panied by  interpreters  speaking  different  languages,  brought 
pheasants  and  the  tusk  of  an  elephant  as  tribute.  Since 
they  were  in  doubt  as  to  how  to  find  their  way  back  to 
their  home,  the  Duke  of  Chou,  the  emperor’s  uncle  and 
prime  minister,  is  said  to  have  presented  them  with  five 
chariots  provided  with  a south-pointing  contrivance 
(chi-nan-ku,  “ south-pointing  chariots ”).  Thus  they  found 
their  way  back  “to  the  seas  of  Fu-nan  and  Lin-i,”  the  last- 
named  country,  well  known  during  the  Han  dynasty,  em- 


128 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


bracing  the  territory  from  which  they  had  come,  as  Legge  ‘ 
has  pointed  out. 

No  trace  of  this  embassy  or  of  the  south-pointing  char- 
iots mentioned  in  connection  with  it  is  contained  in  the 
Shu-king  and  the  Shi-ki.  Legge,  therefore,  looks  upon 
it  as  a myth.  Nevertheless  there  are  early  traces  of  the 
belief  that  such  a contrivance  was  invented,  if  not  by  Chou- 
kung,  at  least  by  some  one  among  the  old  rulers.  The 
philosopher  Han  Fei,  who  died  in  233  b.c.,  says  in  one 
of  his  essays  ^ “ The  early  kings  constructed  the  ssi-nan, 
i.e.  ‘ the  south-pointer,’  in  order  to  fix  the  position  of 
morning  and  evening.”  And  a still  earlier  philosopher, 
Kui-ku-tzi,  who  lived  in  the  fourth  century  b.c.,  refers  to 
the  people  of  Chong  (K’ai-fong-fu)  as  having  made  use  of 
the  “south-pointing  chariot”  {ssl-nan-ku) , when  sending 
for  jade  {Kui-ku-tzi,  sec.  10).  Kui-ku-tzi,  whose  little 
work  is  not  preserved  in  its  entirety,  is  also  quoted  in  the 
T’ai-pHng-yu-lan,  a cyclopedia  of  the  tenth  century,  as 
having  said:  “The  Su-shon^  offered  a white  pheasant  to 
Won-wang.  Lest  they  might  lose  their  way  on  the  jour- 
ney, Chou-kung  constructed  the  ‘ south-pointing  chariot  ’ 
to  accompany  them.”  * 

Possibly  Won-wang  and  Ch’ong-wang  were  confounded 
in  this  passage.  Kui-ku-tzi’s  text  contains  yet  another 
passage  (p.  4 B),  in  which  he  speaks  of  “loadstone  attract- 
ing a needle”;  but,  since  this  need  not  necessarily  involve 
a knowledge  of  the  magnetic  compass,  I lay  no  stress  on  it. 

* Shu-king,  p.  535  seq.  ^ Han-fe'i-tzi,  ch.  ii,  p.  4.  ^ This  is  the 
same  name  by  which,  many  centuries  later,  the  Nii-chon,  Ju-chi,  or 
Djurdjen  Tartars,  the  Tungusic  ancestors  of  the  Manchus,  were 
known,  but  which  in  this  case  probably  represents  an  unknown 
barbarous  tribe  somewhere  near  the  Chinese  territory  mentioned  in 
the  Shu-king,  Legge,  p.  12,  par.  56.  * Legge,  op.  cit.,  p.  537. 


FROM  WU-WANG  TO  K’ANG-WAKG 


129 


From  all  this  it  would  appear  that  as  early  as  the  fourth 
century  b.c.  some  sort  of  a contrivance  indicating  a southern 
direction  either  existed  or  was  believed  to  have  existed  in 
former  times.  In  the  later  literature,  the  term  chi-nan 
(from  chi,  “to  point  with  the  finger,”  and  nan,  “south,” 
and  identical  with  ssi-nan)  is  occasionally  used  meta- 
phorically ; for  instance,  in  the  “ History  of  the  Three  King- 
doms,”' from  which  it  would  appear  that  the  term  was 
known  in  the  sense  of  “ a guide  ” about  the  year  200  a.d.  Yet 
we  have  no  indication  whatever  to  show  what  the  south- 
pointing chariot,  or  chl-nan-ku,  really  was.  We  do  not 
hear  of  the  magnetic  needle  being  used  as  a compass  in 
connection  with  it  any  more  than  on  board  ship  for  several 
centuries  after  the  downfall  of  the  Chou  dynasty;  and  if  the 
needle  was  at  all  connected  with  those  chariots,  the  in- 
vention of  which  was  attributed  to  the  Emperor  Huang-ti 
in  one,  and  to  Chou-kung  in  another  passage  of  the  Ku-kin- 
chu,  a work  of  the  fourth  century  a.d.,  we  possess  no  record 
showing  how  they  were  constructed.  From  an  account  of 
the  history  of  this  invention  contained  in  the  Sung-shu,  a 
historical  work  of  the  fifth  century,^  it  appears  that  the 
secret  of  the  “south-pointing  chariots”  had  been  lost  for 
many  centuries,  when  the  eminent  astronomer  Chang  Hong, 
who  died  in  139  a.d.,  reconstructed  it.  In  the  troubles  caus- 
ing the  downfall  of  the  eastern  Han  dynasty  his  model,  too, 
was  lost  and  consequently  forgotten. 

From  the  third  century  a.d.  renewed  interest  began 
to  be  taken  in  these  mysterious  allusions  of  the  ancient 
literature,  which  led  to  repeated  attempts  to  reconstruct 
what  the  would-be  reconstructors  apparently  mistook  as  a 
mechanical  contrivance;  and  it  appears  that  all  that  was 

* San-kuo-chi,  Shu,  ch.  viii,  p.  4 B.  ^ Ch.  xviii,  p.  4. 


K 


130 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


turned  out  was  a machine  consisting  of  certain  wheels, 
possibly  registering  the  movements  of  the  axle  of  a chariot 
in  such  a manner  as  to  cause  an  index  to  point  in  the 
same  direction,  whatever  direction  the  chariot  might  take. 
I do  not  know  whether  such  a construction  is  actually 
within  the  range  of  possibility;  if  so,  I should  be  inclined 
to  think  that  these  reinventions  were  used  as  mechanical 
toys  to  be  kept  in  some  imperial  museum  as  models  sup- 
posed to  correspond  with  Chou-kung’s  chariots  and  doomed 
to  oblivion  as  being  practically  useless.  I find  it  stated 
in  the  Sung-shu,  to  which  account  Professor  H.  E.  Parker 
has  drawn  attention  in  the  China  Review  (vol.  xviii, 
p.  197),  that  certain  models  made  under  instructions  from 
Shi  Hu,  the  emperor  of  a short-lived  foreign  dynasty  in 
the  middle  of  the  fourth  century,  and  from  Yau  Hing,  an 
emperor  of  the  later  Tsin  dynasty  (about  400),  fell  into 
the  hands  of  the  Sung  court  in  417  a.d.,  but  “ the  machinery 
being  too  coarse,  the  south-pointer  showed  so  often  in 
the  wrong  direction  that  men  were  required  to  set  it  right 
again.”  Subsequent  attempts  are  spoken  of  as  having 
been  more  successful,  but,  as  I understand  the  Sung-shu, 
the  author  of  this  account  thinks  of  “machinery”  and  is 
not  aware  of  the  real  agent,  although  he  casually  remarks 
that,  during  the  Tsin  dynasty  (265-420),  there  was 
also  a chi-nan-c^dii,  i.e.  “a  south-pointing  ship”  The 
Emperor  Yau  King’s  contrivance  is  more  clearly  described 
in  the  biography  of  its  engineer,*  which  says  it  had  no 
machinery  at  all,  but  that,  whenever  it  was  put  in  motion, 
a man  had  to  step  inside  to  move  the  apparatus.  Reading 
between  the  lines,  I am  inclined  to  assume  that  this  re- 
mark strongly  suggests  the  use  of  a compass,  the  man  who 
* Nan-ts’i-shu,  ch.  lii,  p.  15. 


FROM  WU-WANG  TO  K’ANG-WANG 


131 


had  to  step  inside  giving  the  chariot  the  direction  ascer- 
tained from  it.  Yet  we  find  in  the  Sung-shl  ^ the  detailed 
description  of  the  model  of  a “south-pointing  chariot,” 
seriously  submitted  to  the  Emperor  Jon-tsung  as  late  as 
1027  A.D.,  based  on  a most  complicated  system  of  cogged 
wheels  (diameters  and  numbers  of  cogs  being  given),  and 
said  to  have  been  originally  constructed  about  806  a.d.  A 
similar  machine,  also  described  in  the  Sung-shl,  was  con- 
structed in  1107,  when  it  was  submitted  to  the  Emperor 
Hui-tsung.  From  other  sources  it  may  be  shown  that  at 
this  time  the  magnetic  needle  must  have  been  well  known, 
if  not  as  a guide  to  mariners,  at  least  as  an  instrument  in 
the  hands  of  geomancers  for  centuries  before  that  date. 
Dr.  Edkins,  in  his  paper  “On  Chinese  Names  for  Boats  and 
Boat  Gear,”  quotes  Mr.  Wylie  in  showing  that  the  Buddhist 
priest  and  imperial  astronomer  I-hing  at  the  beginning  of 
the  eighth  century  knew  not  only  the  south-pointing 
qualities  of  the  magnetic  needle,  but  also  its  eastern  devia- 
tion.^ Since  no  references  are  given,  I am  not  able  to  con- 
firm the  fact,  but  I am  certain  that  the  deviation  of  the 
needle  was  well  known  in  China  about  the  year  1115  a.d., 
when  it  was  described  in  the  Pon-ts'au-yen-i?  It  was  there 
stated  that,  if  one  rubbed  a needle  with  loadstone,  it 
would  point  to  the  south,  but  that  it  would  always  deviate 
a little  to  the  east  and  not  show  due  south.  To  prepare 
the  contrivance,  one  had  to  single  out  a fine  thread  from  a 
new  skein  of  silk  floss  and  fix  it  with  half  a candareen  of 
bees’  wax  on  the  middle  of  the  needle,  the  latter  to  be  hung 
up  where  there  was  no  wind.  The  needle  would  then  always 

‘ Ch.  cxlix,  p.  15.  ^Journal  of  the  China  Branch,  Royal  Asiatic 
Society,  N.S.,  vol.  xi,  p.  138.  ® Quoted  in  the  Ko-chi-king-yuan,  ch. 
xlix,  p.  12  B. 


132 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


point  to  the  south.  By  sticking  the  needle  through  a piece 
of  lamp  wick  (which  in  China  is  made  of  pith),  thus  causing 
it  to  float  on  the  water,  it  would  also  point  to  the  south  with 
a slight  deviation,  which  the  author  tries  to  explain  from 
the  mystic  point  of  view  of  Chinese  natural  philosophy. 
Shon  Kua,  who  wrote  about  the  middle  of  the  eleventh 
century,  gives  a still  clearer  account  of  the  contrivance, 
which,  according  to  his  own  words,  was  used  by  the  jang- 
kia,  or  geomancers,  and  he  says  absolutely  nothing  about 
its  use  in  navigation.  He  also  describes  the  deviation  of 
the  needle,  without  any  attempt  at  explanation.  For, 
“the  reason  why  loadstone  points  to  the  south,  just  as 
cypresses  point  to  the  west,  cannot  be  explained.”  ’ Since 
Shon  Kua  was  a native  of  Hangchow,  where  in  those  days 
a lively  traffic  existed  with  Arab  and  Persian  traders,  it 
seems  quite  possible  that  the  latter  have  seen  the  needle 
used  for  geomantic  purposes  somewhere  in  that  neighbor- 
hood, if  not  in  Chinchew  (Zaitun)  or  Canton,  learned  the 
secret  of  its  preparation  from  the  Chinese,  and  discovered 
its  further  use  in  navigation. 

Tlie  Ch'au-ye-ts’ien-tsai^  states  that  in  692  a.d.  a me- 
chanic was  sent  to  court  from  Hai-chou,  a seaport  on  the 
coast  south  of  Kiau-chou  (Shan-tung),  who  had  constructed 
a “chariot  showing  the  twelve  hours  of  the  day”  {shi-ir- 
ch’dn-ku)  by  the  shaft  being  turned  due  south.  It  looks 
very  much  as  though  the  magnetic  needle  had  something 
to  do  with  it,  too.  It  may  have  been  a mechanical  toy  to 
be  used  indoors,  somewhat  like  another  “south-pointing 
chariot,’’'  so  styled  and  described  on  the  preceding  page  of 
the  cyclopedia  referred  to  as  being  only  seven  and  one-half 

* M ong-k’ i-pi-t’ an,  ch.  xxiv,  p.  7 B.  ^ A work  of  the  eighth  century 
A.D.  quoted  in  the  Ko-cfii-king-yuan,  ch.  xxix,  p.  25. 


FROM  WU-WANG  TO  K’ANG-WANG 


133 


inches  long  and  about  fifteen  inches  high,  and  not  a chariot 
in  the  ordinary  sense. 

The  earliest  unmistakable  mention  of  the  use  of  the 
magnetic  needle  as  a guide  to  mariners  that  I have  been 
able  to  find  in  Chinese  literature  is  probably  as  old  as  the 
knowledge  of  its  use  in  Europe.  It  occurs  in  a work  of  the 
twelfth  century,  entitled  P’ing-chdu-k’o-t’an,  and  compiled 
by  one  Chu  Yii,  a native  of  Hu-chou  in  Cho-kiang.  In 
the  second  chapter  of  this  work  the  author  has  inserted  a 
series  of  notes  on  the  foreign  trade  at  Canton,  w^hich,  pre- 
vious to  the  arrival  of  the  Portuguese  in  Eastern  waters, 
had  been  in  the  hands  of  Arab  and  Persian  navigators. 
Since,  from  what  we  know  of  the  author’s  lifetime,  he  him- 
self never  lived  at  Canton,  whereas  his  father,  Chu  Fu,  had 
held  office  there  at  the  end  of  the  eleventh  century,  the 
critics  of  the  great  Catalogue  of  the  Imperial  Library  at 
Peking ' hold  that  his  information  about  the  foreign  trade 
in  Canton  is  based  on  accounts  of  Chu,  the  father,  and  that 
it,  therefore,  dates  from  the  latter  part  of  the  eleventh 
century  a.d.  This  view  is  supported  by  the  fact  that 
the  years  1086  and  1099  are  mentioned  in  Chu  Yii’s 
paragraphs  referring  to  Canton  in  other  connections. 
Among  these  interesting  notes  I find  (ch.  ii,  p.  2)  one 
referring  to  the  foreign  ships  by  which  trade  w^as  carried  on 
between  Canton  and  San-fo-ts’i  (Palembang)  on  the  coast 
of  Sumatra  and  farther  on  to  the  ports  in  Arabian  coun- 
tries, including  India.  It  runs  as  follows : — 

“In  clear  weather  the  Captain  ascertains  the  ship’s  position,  at 
night  by  looking  at  the  stars,  in  the  daytime  by  looking  at  the  sun ; 
in  dark  weather  he  looks  at  the  south-pointing  needle  (chi-nan-chon) . 
Sometimes  he  will  make  use  of  a rope,  ten  chang  in  length,  to  hook 

* Tsung-mu,  ch.  cxli,  p 15  seq. 


134 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


up  mud  from  the  bottom  of  the  sea,  the  smell  of  which  will  tell  him 
where  to  go.  In  the  open  sea  there  is  no  rain ; and  when  it  rains, 
they  are  nearing  land,”  etc. 

The  wording  of  this  passage  is  such  that  it  gives  us  no 
clue  as  to  whether  or  no  the  Chinese  at  the  time  were 
familiar  with  the  use  of  the  compass  on  shipboard.  I am 
inclined  to  think,  however,  that  attempts  to  use  the  needle 
on  ships  must  have  been  made  in  China  about  as  early  as 
it  was  known  there  to  geomancers,  but  that  it  was  aban- 
doned as  a useless  luxury  by  the  conservative  junk  masters, 
who  were  accustomed  to  steer  their  ships  by  bearings  and 
soundings,  and  who  scarcely  ever  required  a compass  for 
their  coasting  trips.  Navigation  on  the  high  seas  in  those 
days  was  in  the  hands  of  foreigners  (Arabs  and  Persians) ; 
and  this  may  be  the  reason  why  we  first  hear  of  them  as 
having  turned  the  old  Chinese  invention  to  practical  use 
on  shipboard. 

We  have  seen  that,  apart  from  the  great  probability 
of  the  magnetic  needle  being  known  in  high  antiquity, 
instances  are  on  record  of  its  use  during  the  Middle  Ages 
for  geomantic  purposes.  If  my  assumption  proves  correct, 
that  the  magnetic  needle  was  seen  by  Arab  traders  on  the 
coast  of  China  in  the  hands  of  geomancers,  was  applied  by 
them  to  navigation,  and  was  then  brought  back  to  China 
as  the  “mariner’s  compass,”  the  history  of  this  invention 
may  be  looked  upon  as  perfectly  analogous  to  that  of  gun- 
powder, the  preparation  of  which  was  probably  known  to 
the  Chinese  long  before  they  learned  its  application  to 
firearms  through  Europeans. 


FROM  WU-WANG  TO  K’ANG-WANG 


135 


ABSTRACT  OF  DATES 

2704-2594  b.c.  The  invention  of  the  “south-pointing  chariot" 
ascribed  to  the  legendary  Emperor  Huang-ti  according  to  the 
Ku-kin-chu  (4th  cent.  a.d.). 

1231-1135  B.c.  “South-pointing  chariots”  were  presented  by  Wbn- 
wang  to  certain  ambassadors.  The  passage,  which  may  be 
wrongly  handed  down,  is  contained  in  the  Kui-ku-tzi,  a work 
of  the  fourth  century  b.c. 

1115-1079  B.c. , under  Ch'ong-wang.  Legend  of  the  arrival  of  am- 
bassadors from  the  south,  conducted  home  by  the  aid  of  “ south- 
pointing chariots.”  No  indication  is  on  record  as  to  what  these 
were.  The  entire  account  is  legendary  and  not  backed  by  con- 
temporaneous records. 

4th  Cent.  b.c.  The  philosopher  Kui-ku-tzi  speaks  of  the  use  of  the 
“south-pointing  chariot”  by  the  people  of  Chong.  He  knows 
that  loadstone  will  attract  a needle. 

233  B.c.  The  philosopher  Han  Fei  speaks  of  a “south-pointer” 
by  which  the  position  of  east  and  west  may  be  ascertained. 

139  A.n.  The  astronomer  Chang  Hong  tries  to  reconstruct  the  old 
“south-pointing  chariot.”  His  model,  however,  was  lost  and 
forgotten. 

200.  The  term  chi-nan  (“south-pointer,”  or  “compass”)  is  used 
figuratively  in  the  sense  of  “a  guide”  (San-kuo-chi). 

35Q-400.  The  emperors  Shi  Hu  and  Yau  Hing  are  in  the  possession 
of  apparatuses  pointing  south;  but,  the  “machinery”  being 
defective,  they  point  wrong  (Sung-shu),  and  in  Yau  Hing’s  con- 
trivance a man  is  required  to  move  it  (Nan-ts’i-shu). 

265-420.  “South-pointing  ships”  (chi-nan-chdu)  are  mentioned. 

692.  A south-pointing  contrivance  showing  the  hours  of  the  day  is 
invented. 

700.  The  Buddhist  astronomer  I-hing  is  familiar  with  the  eastern 
deviation  of  the  magnetic  needle.  (Edkins,  quoting  Wylie.) 
Wylie,  in  a paper  entitled  “The  Magnetic  Compass  in  China,” 
reprinted  in  Chinese  Researches  (Shanghai,  1897),  p.  155,  says: 
“A  passage  from  the  life  of  Yih-hing,  a Buddhist  priest  and 
imperial  astronomer  at  the  commencement  of  the  eighth  century, 
will  show  that  the  subject  had  engaged  attention  at  least  nine 
hundred  years  earlier  [than  the  seventeenth  century].  It  is 
said,  that  ‘ on  comparing  the  needle  with  the  north  pole,  he  found 
the  former  pointed  between  the  constellations  hii  and  wei.  The 
pole  was  just  in  6 degrees  of  hii,  from  which  the  needle  declined 


136 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


to  the  right  (east)  2°  95'.  As  it  declined  to  the  right  of  the  north 
pole,  it  was  necessarily  to  the  left  of  the  south  pole.'  ” I have 
not  succeeded  in  finding  this  passage  in  the  lives  of  I-hing  I 
was  able  to  consult,  but  take  it  for  granted,  on  the  excellent 
authority  of  the  late  Mr.  Wylie,  that  it  is  contained  in  some  other 
Chinese  text,  which  I hope  to  be  able  to  hunt  up  some  day. 
Unfortunately  neither  Mr.  Wylie  nor  Dr.  Edkins  has  given  chap- 
ter and  verse  of  this  passage,  so  very  important  in  the  history 
of  our  subject. 

806.  A south-pointing  contrivance  consisting  of  cogged  wheels 
is  said  in  the  Sung-shi  to  have  been  constructed. 

1027.  A “south-pointing  chariot,”  described  as  a mechanical  con- 
trivance, is  submitted  to  the  Emperor  Jon-tsung  (Sung-shi). 

1030-1093.  Lifetime  of  the  encyclopaedist  Shdn  Kua,  who  speaks 
of  the  magnetic  needle  and  its  deviation  as  used  for  geomantic 
purposes. 

1100,  or  earlier.  Probable  first  unmistakable  mention  on  record 
in  Chinese  literature  of  the  use  on  shipboard  of  the  “south- 
pointing  needle”  by  foreign  (Arab  and  Persian)  navigators  at 
Canton. 

1107.  A “south-pointing  chariot,”  also  described  as  a system  of 
cogged  wheels,  etc.,  is  submitted  to  the  Emperor  Hui-tsung. 

1115.  The  magnetic  needle  is  described  in  detail  and  its  deviation 
mentioned  in  the  Pon-ts’ au-yen-i,  where  no  allusion  is  made  to 
its  use  on  shipboard. 


§ 26.  Ch’ong-wang’s  Reign  (Continued) 

After  the  alleged  embassy  from  the  Yiie-ch’ang  barbarians 
in  Tung-king,  Ch’ong-wang  decided  to  erect  a new  capital 
which  should  be  more  centrally  situated  than  his  old  resi- 
dence in  the  west ; and  he  selected  the  city  of  Lo-yang,  cor- 
responding to  the  present  city  of  Ho-nan-fu.  Chou-kung 
made  all  the  necessary  arrangements,  and  the  court  re- 
moved to  Lo-yang.  The  country  about  Lo-yang  being 
supposed  to  occupy  the  middle  of  the  then  Chinese  empire, 
it  was  called,  in  distinction  from  the  other  provinces, 


FROM  WU-WANG  TO  K’ANG-WANG 


137 


Chung-kuo,  the  “Middle  Country,”  or  the  “Middle  King- 
dom.” In  this  sense  the  term,  which  has  been  quoted  as 
the  origin  of  the  present  name  for  China  and  which  is 
generally  translated  by  the  “Middle  Kingdom,”  occurs 
repeatedly  in  the  Shi-king.  The  same  classic,  however, 
contains  an  ode  ‘ in  which  long  before  that  Won-wang, 
Ch’ong-wang’s  grandfather,  is  made  to  use  the  term 
Chung-kuo  in  the  sense  of  China  as  opposed  to  Kui-fang,  or 
the  “Demon  Regions.”  In  the  “Tribute  of  Yii”^  China 
is  unmistakably  to  be  understood  by  the  term  Chung- 
pang,  which  Legge  translates  by  the  “Middle  Regions.” 
Another  name  Chung-yuan,  which  may  be  translated  by 
“Middle  Plain,”  occurs  in  the  sense  of  “China”  in  the 
Sfii-king  and  other  classics.  All  this  shows  that,  during 
the  Chou  dynasty  and  probably  even  long  before  that,  the 
Chinese  looked  upon  their  country  as  the  middle  of  the 
world. 

In  1105  B.c.  Chou-kung  died,  and  Ch’ong-wang  buried 
him  with  royal  honors.  The  Chinese  nation  regards  him 
as  one  of  the  most  important  personages  in  its  history. 
Mencius,®  referring  to  Yii,  Confucius,  and  Chou-kung, 
speaks  of  the  “Three  Great  Sages”  (san-shong)  whose  work 
he  should  like  to  continue.  Chou-kung  was  the  type  of  a 
monarchist ; and  the  example  of  loyalty  set  by  him  may  be 
called  the  mainstay  of  the  stability  of  the  Chou  dynasty. 
The  long  duration  of  that  uniform  spirit  of  Chinese  official 
life  which,  in  spite  of  all  political  and  personal  changes,  has 
under  all  dynasties  come  to  the  front  again,  is  mainly  the 
work  of  this  model  statesman,  the  main  spokesman  of  hu- 
mane government  and  absolute  justice  on  the  one  hand 
and  of  undisputed  legitimacy  of  the  supreme  ruler  on  the 

* Legge,  p.  509.  ^ Legge,  Shu-king,  p.  141.  ® Legge,  p.  160. 


138 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


other.  “In  former  times,”  Mencius  says,  “Yii  repressed 
the  vast  waters  of  the  inundation,  and  the  empire  was 
reduced  to  order.  Chou-kung’s  achievements  extended 
even  to  the  barbarous  tribes  of  the  west  and  north;  he 
drove  away  all  ferocious  animals;  and  the  people  enjoyed 
repose.”  Mencius  sings  Chou-kung’s  praises  to  mark  the 
contrast  with  certain  philosophers  of  his  own  time,  espe- 
cially Yang  Chu,  the  cynic,  “whose  principle  was  each  one 
for  himself,  and  who  would  not  acknowledge  the  claims  of 
the  sovereign.”  “These  father-deniers  and  king-deniers 
would  have  been  smitten  by  Chou-kung,”  says  Mencius. 
If  Chou-kung  had  done  nothing  but  furnish  the  germs  of 
that  unique  code,  the  Chdu-li,  he  would  indeed  have  done 
more  to  give  to  Chinese  official  life  its  characteristic  feature 
of  systematization  than  any  ruler,  statesman,  or  philosopher 
after  him. 

The  years  of  Ch’ong-wang’s  reign  following  Chou-kung’s 
death  were  spent  in  peaceful  government.  Ch’ong-wang 
died  in  1079  b.c.  Chau,  his  heir  presumptive,  being  a 
minor,  he  had  appointed  the  dukes  of  Shau  and  Pi  as 
regents,  under  whose  guidance  Chau  ascended  the  throne. 
He  reigned  under  the  name  of  K’ang-wang. 


§ 27.  K’ang-wang  (1078-1053  b.c.) 

K’ang-wang’s  rule,  like  that  of  his  father,  was  a great 
blessing  to  the  empire,  being  full  of  humanity  and  of  love 
for  his  people.  The  Duke  of  Shau  (Shau-kung),  one  of 
his  guardians,  who  acted  as  his  prime  minister,  actively 
seconded  him  in  this  friendly  disposition.  The  duke’s 
condescension  toward  the  people  was  so  great  that  he 


FROM  WU-WANG  TO  K’ANG-WANG 


139 


would  travel  about  the  country  in  order  to  listen  to  their 
grievances.  The  result  was  his  great  popularity,  which 
has  found  a lasting  memorial  in  one  of  the  best-known  odes 
of  the  Shi-king : ‘ — 

“This  umbrageous  sweet  pear  tree; 

Clip  it  not,  break  not  a twig  of  it. 

For  under  it  the  Duke  of  Shau  rested.” 

The  sweet  pear  tree  (kan-t’ang,  the  translation  being  doubt- 
ful) has  ever  since  been  the  symbol  of  the  people’s  apprecia- 
tion of  condescension  and  kindness  shown  to  them. 

* Legge,  p.  26. 


V 


GRADUAL  DECLINE  OF  CENTRAL  POWER 


V 


GRADUAL  DECLINE  OF  CENTRAL  POWER 

§ 28.  Chau-wang  (1052-1002  b.c.) 

SSI-MA  TS’I-^^N  insinuates  that  under  Chau-wang  "the 
king’s  ways  became  feeble  and  defective.”  He  left 
the  cares  of  government  to  his  ministers,  among 
whom  were  none  like  the  dukes  of  Chou  and  Shau.  In 
spite  of  serious  warnings  given  by  Heaven  in  the  shape  of 
natural  phenomena,  the  king  would  not  change  his  ways, 
but  devoted  himself  solely  to  pleasure.  To  indulge  in  the 
chase,  he  did  not  mind  spoiling  the  crops  in  the  fields  of 
his  subjects.  The  respectful  remonstrances  of  his  ministers 
made  no  impression  on  him.  In  1002  b.c.  there  was  a 
revolt  among  the  people  of  Ch’u,  the  semi-barbarous  state 
on  the  southern  frontier.  Chau-wang  went  south  to  make 
war  on  the  barbarians.  Even  then  he  looked  upon  the 
campaign  as  a sort  of  pleasure  trip  and,  by  damaging  the 
fields  of  his  people  in  pursuit  of  his  hunting  parties,  drew 
on  himself  their  dislike.  To  enable  him  to  cross  a river, 
— said  by  some  to  have  been  the  Kiang  or  Yang-tzi,  by 
others,  the  Han-kiang, — the  people  furnished  him  with  a 
boat,  the  boards  of  which  were  insecurely  fastened  together 
— the  time-honored  method  of  committing  a political  mur- 
der. In  the  middle  of  the  river  the  boat  broke  up,  and  the 
king  had  a narrow  escape  from  drowning.  He  died  soon 
after  as  a result  of  this  “accident.” 

143 


144 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


§ 29.  Mu-wang  (1001-947  b.c.) 

On  going  south  with  his  army,  Chau-wang  had  appointed 
regent  his  son  Man,  and  the  latter  on  his  father’s  death 
ascended  the  throne  imder  the  name  of  Mu-wang.  He  was 
then  at  the  ripe  age  of  fifty,  and  was  a great  admirer  of  the 
virtue  of  his  forefathers  Won  and  Wu.  Details  of  his  life 
and  government  in  the  Shu-king  are  very  scant,  and  a great 
deal  of  what  we  know  about  him  has  been  supplemented 
by  later  authorities.  The  most  prominent  of  his  charac- 
teristics referred  to  by  these  is  his  restless  love  of  traveling 
beyond  the  confines  of  his  empire.  His  alleged  journeys 
to  the  West  have  given  rise  to  the  wildest  speculations  as 
to  his  having  been  a mediator  between  the  western  Asiatic 
and  Chinese  civilizations.  The  Bamboo  Books  contain 
only  a few  allusions  to  his  expeditions  against  the  hordes  of 
the  K’iian  barbarians,  or  K'uan-jung,  identified  by  the 
Chinese  commentators  with  the  later  Hiung-nu,  or  the 
Huns,  who,  as  I have  already  shown,  had  under  various 
names  linguistically  answering  to  the  root  Hun  or  Kun, 
engaged  the  king’s  forefathers,  when  they  (the  Hiimg-nu) 
were  still  holding  the  northwestern  borders  of  the  empire 
during  the  Shang  dynasty  under  T’ai-wang  and  Won-wang. 
Besides  a number  of  hunting  and  punitive  expeditions  and 
journeys  described  as  “tours  of  inspection,”  the  Bamboo 
Books  ‘ record  that,  “ in  his  seventeenth  year  he  [Mu-wang] 
went  on  a punitive  expedition  to  Mt.  K’un-lun  and  saw  the 
Si-wang-mu  [lit.  “Western  King’s  Mother”].  That  year 
he  [Si-wang-mu]  came  to  court.”  Here  a note  is  added, 
which  may  be  that  of  a commentator  of  later  date,  saying 
that  “the  king,  in  his  expeditions  to  the  north,  traveled  a 
‘ Legge,  Shu-king,  Prolegomena,  p.  150  seq. 


GRADUAL  DECLINE  OF  CENTRAL  POWER  145 


thousand  li  over  the  Liu-sha”  (“The  Moving  Sands,”  by 
which  name  any  part  of  the  central  Asiatic  desert  west  of 
the  Great  Wall  may  be  understood,  if  not  the  Desert  of 
Takla-makan) ; that  he  also  traveled  “a  thousand  li  over 
the  Tsi-yii”  [lit.  “Heaped-up  Feathers”];  and  that  “he 
made  war  on  the  K’iian-jung  [Huns?]  and  returned  to  the 
east  with  their  five  kings  as  captives.”  Westward  he  is 
said  to  have  “pushed  his  expeditions  to  where  the  green 
birds  cast  their  feathers”  (said  by  some  Chinese  commenta- 
tors to  be  identical  with  the  San-wei-shan  near  the  Tang-ho, 
an  affluent  of  the  Bulungir).  The  note  ends  by  saying  that 
on  these  expeditions  he  traveled  over  190,000  li.  This 
dry-as-dust  account  is  greatly  supplemented  by  another 
work  specially  devoted  to  Mu-wang’s  expeditions,  the 
Mu-t’ien-tzi-chuan,  “ Biography  of  Mu,  the  Son  of  Heaven,” 
probably  originating  in  a period  not  later  than  the  third 
century  b.c.,  if  we  accept  the  fact  that  it  was  found  in  a 
tomb  of  one  of  the  Wei  princes  dating  from  281  b.c.  Of 
this  work  Wylie  ‘ says : “ It  savors  too  much  of  the  fabulous 
to  be  admitted  among  the  authentic  records,  but  it  is  pre- 
served as  a specimen  of  ancient  composition.” 

The  work  contains  a host  of  geographical  names  which 
it  is  scarcely  possible  now  to  identify,  the  best  known  of 
which  is  that  of  Mt.  K’un-lun,  where  the  king  is  supposed 
to  have  met  Si-wang-mu.  The  name  K’un-lun  first  occurs 
in  the  Shu-king  ^ in  the  list  of  articles  said  to  have  been  sent 
to  the  Emperor  Yii ; but  in  that  passage  it  seems  extremely 
doubtful  whether  it  does  not  apply  to  the  name  of  some 
wild  tribe  of  the  West  furnishing  “hair-cloth  and  skins.” 
It  seems  quite  possible  that  this  name,  as  mentioned  in  the 
Bamboo  Books,  amounts  to  no  more  than  this;  but  since 
' Notes  on  Chinese  Literature,  p.  153.  ^ Legge,  p.  127. 


146 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


it  is  there  described  as  a hill,  it  can  be  understood  how  the 
author,  or  some  interpolator,  of  the  Mu-t’ien-tzl-chvnn  came 
to  identify  it  with  the  K’un-lun-shan,  or  Karakorum  range, 
the  reputed  source  of  the  Yellow  River,  which,  according 
to  early  Chinese  ideas,  took  its  rise  in  the  affluents  of  the 
Tarim,  and  disappeared  into  the  ground  at  Lake  Lob-nor, 
reappearing  at  its  real  source  in  northwestern  Tibet.  The 
K’un-lun-shan  has  in  times  much  more  recent  than  the 
Shu-king  grown  into  a sort  of  fairy-land  and  become  the 
seat  of  numerous  legendary  creations,  among  which  is  the 
Si-wang-mu,  who,  owing  to  the  meaning  of  these  three 
words,  is  usually  represented  as  a queen,  the  “ Royal  Lady 
of  the  West,”  heading  the  troops  of  genii  inhabiting  Mt. 
K’un-lun  and  holding  from  time  to  time  intercourse  with 
favorite  imperial  votaries.  Such  is  the  legend  which  has 
grown  up  in  the  course  of  ages  from  the  slender  basis 
afforded  by  the  occurrence  of  the  name  in  very  early  tra- 
ditions. An  obscure  reference  to  Si-wang-mu  is  also  to  be 
found  in  the  Shan-hai-king,  a geographical  record  possibly 
as  old  as  it  is  insipid ; and  upon  these  ancient  notices  the 
philosopher  Lie-tzi  is  supposed  to  have  based  in  the  fifth 
century  b.c.  a fanciful  and  perhaps  allegorical  tale  of  the 
entertainment  with  which  King  Mu  was  honored  and  en- 
thralled by  the  supernatural  being.  In  later  ages  the 
superstitious  vagaries  of  the  Emperor  Wu-ti  (140-87  b.c.) 
gave  rise  to  innumerable  fables  respecting  the  alleged  visits 
paid  to  that  monarch  by  Si-wang-mu  and  her  fairy  troop; 
and  the  imagination  of  the  Tauist  writers  of  the  ensuing 
centuries  was  exercised  in  glowing  descriptions  of  her 
mountain  palace.*  Her  palace  was  supposed  to  stand  on 
Mt.  K’un-lun  which,  after  Wu-ti’s  expeditions,  was  well 
* From  Mayers,  The  Chinese  Reader’s  Manual,  p.  178;  cf.  p.  108  seq. 


GRADUAL  DECLINE  OF  CENTRAL  POWER  147 


known  to  be  somewhere  in  the  south  of  Khotan.  It  is 
understood  by  all  serious  Chinese  historians  that  the  gen- 
eral Chang  K’i4n,  who  returned  from  his  first  journey  to  the 
West  in  126  b.c.,  was  the  first  to  bring  notices  to  China  of 
such  countries  even  as  near  the  western  boundaries  as 
Khotan.  The  mention  of  the  K’un-lun  in  connection  with 
Mu-wang’s  travels  must  therefore  remain  a puzzle,  unless 
we  assume  that  some  other  region  much  nearer  to  his  own 
dominions  is  indicated  by  this  name.  We  need  not  be 
astonished  to  find  such  shifting  of  names,  which  Mr.  Kings- 
mill  thinks  correspond  to  the  development  of  geograph- 
ical knowledge  among  the  Chinese.  Although  the  K’un-lun 
itself,  after  it  was  once  understood  to  be  identical  with 
Mt.  Karakorum,  was  not  affected  thereby,  several  of  the 
other  creations  of  Chinese  popular  imagination  can  be 
shown  to  have  wandered  to  the  West  in  the  same  measure 
that  matter-of-fact  knowledge  began  to  extend  in  China. 
This  refers  especially  to  certain  legendary  terms  associated 
with  each  other  in  the  very  earliest  periods.  The  Si-wang- 
mu,  mistaken  for  a fairy  queen,  owing  to  the  name  being 
transcribed  with  characters  suggesting  such  an  interpreta- 
tion, had  been  made  to  live  somewhere  on  a hill,  sometimes 
called  the  "White  Jade  Hill,”  in  a palace  of  jade.  Near  her 
abode  were  the  Liu-sha,  or  “ Shifting  Sands  ” : and  this  may 
have  been  any  part  of  the  Tarim  desert,  even  to  the  east 
of  Lake  Lob-nor,  since  the  Liu-sha  is  said  by  Chinese  geog- 
raphers to  begin  about  eighty  li  west  of  Sha-chou.  Another 
name  which  also  occurs  in  the  Shu-king  is  the  Jo-shui,  or 
"Weak  Water,”  to  the  west  of  which  the  "Western  King’s 
Mother”  held  court.  I am  inclined  to  assume  that  the 
localities  covertly  referred  to  by  these  legendary  terms 
were  originally  much  nearer  the  Chou  empire  than  they 


148 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


were  held  to  be  later  on,  and  that,  being  constantly  asso- 
ciated with  the  western  terminus  of  what  was  to  the  ancient 
Chinese  the  inhabited  world,  their  imaginary  position  had 
to  be  shifted  farther  west  from  time  to  time;  for,  in  ac- 
cordance with  some  of  these  legends,  the  Si-wang-mu  had 
to  be  located  somewhere  near  the  place  “where  the  sun 
sets.”  When  Chang  K’ien  retiirned  from  his  visit  to 
Bactria,  he  had  found  there  was  a still  farther  West;  and 
when  the  first  detailed  accounts  of  Ta-ts’in,  i.e.  the  eastern 
provinces  of  the  Roman  empire,  became  known  in  China, 
the  Chinese  became  aware  that  T’iau-chi,  or  Chaldea, 
which  after  Chang  K’ien’s  expeditions  had  been  nearly 
the  westernmost  Asiatic  country  known,  by  name  at 
least,  in  China,  was  not  the  end  of  the  world,  but  that 
Ta-ts’in,  or  Syria,  was  still  farther  west.  For,  as  Chi- 
nese writers  in  the  second  century  a.d.  say,  “formerly 
it  was  wrongly  believed  that  the  Jo-shui,  or  ‘Weak 
Water,’  was  in  the  west  of  T’iau-chi;  now  the  Jo-shui 
is  in  the  west  of  Ta-ts’in.  Formerly  it  was  wrongly  be- 
lieved that,  going  over  two  hundred  days  west  of  T’iau- 
chi,  one  came  near  ‘the  place  where  the  sun  sets’;  now 
one  comes  near  the  place  where  the  sun  sets  by  going 
west  of  Ta-ts’in.”  ‘ 

As  to  the  Si-wang-mu  mentioned  in  the  Bamboo  Books 
as  having  visited  Mu-wang’s  court,  the  responsibility  for 
all  the  fanciful  tales  heaped  about  that  name  must  be  left 
to  later  authors.  If  we  confine  ourselves  to  the  really 
oldest  texts,  or  even  to  the  more  detailed  account  of  the 
Mu-t'ien-tzi-chuan,  there  is  nothing  to  prevent  us  from 
adopting  the  opinion  expressed  by  the  author  of  a critique 
of  the  work  published  in  the  great  Catalogue  of  the  Imperial 
‘ Hirth,  China  and  the  Roman  Orient,  pp.  68,  291  seqq. 


GRADUAL  DECLINE  OF  CENTRAL  POWER  149 


Library  of  Peking.^  This  view  has  been  independently 
arrived  at  by  Dr.  E.  J.  Eitel,  to  whom  we  are  indebted  for 
a translation  of  the  work,  with  some  valuable  explanatory 
notes.^  Regarding  the  name  Si-wang-mu,  Dr.  Eitel  says: 

“These  three  characters  probably  are  merely  a transliteration  of 
a name  belonging  to  a polysyllabic  non-Chinese  language.  The 
meaning  of  the  individual  characters,  chosen  to  represent  the  foreign 
name,  ought  not  to  prejudice  the  reader.  There  is  nothing  in  this 
or  any  other  ancient  text  to  indicate  that  Si-wang-mu  was  a woman. 
Taking  this  name  like  other  names  in  our  text,  it  seems  to  me  best 
to  treat  Si-wang-mu  as  the  name  of  a tribe  whose  chief  went  by 
the  same  name.” 

Such  transformations  are  by  no  means  uncommon  in 
legendary  subjects  of  periods  much  more  recent  even  than 
the  Si-wang-mu  legend;  and  the  change  of  a man  into  a 
woman  has  its  parallel  in  Buddhist  lore,  if  we  consider  that 
the  goddess  Kuan-yin,  the  Holy  Virgin  of  the  Chinese,  has 
grown  out  of  Avalokites’vara,  an  Indian  male  divinity 
represented  as  late  as  the  eighth  century  by  the  great 
Chinese  painter  Wu  Tau-tzi,  the  Godoshi  of  the  Japanese, 
as  a tall  young  man  with  a respectable  mustache. 

The  impression  I myself  have  received  with  regard  to 
the  historical  signification  of  Mu-wang  from  a survey  of 
the  native  literature  is  as  follows:  If  we  fall  back  on  the 
very  oldest  records,  there  is  nothing  to  prevent  us  from 
assuming  that  the  emperor  was  fond  of  traveling  about,  but 
that  his  most  distant  journeys  did  not  take  him  far  beyond 
the  present  wall  frontier  in  the  west.  Even  Terrien  de 
Lacouperie  puts  a stop  to  the  emperor’s  progress  at  Karashar, 
which  he  thinks  may  be  considered  as  the  farthest  point 


* Ch.  cxlii,  p.  4. 


^ China  Review,  vol.  xvii,  pp.  223,  247. 


150 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


reached  in  a westerly  direction.*  In  that  case  the  accounts 
of  the  K’un-lun  and  all  that  can  be  proved  to  refer  to  the 
western  part  of  Chinese  Turkestan  should  be  looked  upon 
as  having  been  interpolated  in  later  times.  If,  however, 
we  adopt  Dr.  Eitel’s  opinion,  who  looks  upon  the  Mu- 
t’ien-tzi-chuan  as  a work  of  the  tenth  century  b.c.,  we  could 
not  well  deny  that  some  region  called  K’un-lun,  if  not  the 
Karakarum,  was  then  known  to  the  Chinese.  The  former 
opinion  had  found  its  advocates  among  the  Chinese  them- 
selves, since  the  local  records  of  the  city  of  Su-chou  in 
Kan-su  claim  the  K’un-lun-shan,  where  Mu-wang  met  Si- 
wang-mu,  to  have  been  identical  with  a certain  hill  called 
Siie-shan,  i.e.  “Snow  Mountain,”  situated  two  hundred  and 
fifty  li  southwest  of  that  city  (Su-chou).  The  inventor  of 
this  theory,  a magistrate  by  the  name  of  Ma  Ki,  who  lived 
during  the  tenth  century  a.d.,  thought  he  had  to  look  for 
“ Si-wang-mu’s  Stone  House  and  Jade  Hall”  in  this  locality. 

The  Si-wang-mu  legend  and  the  relations  of  Mu-wang  with 
that  mysterious  personage  have  quite  lately  given  rise  to 
a somewhat  extravagant  view  of  the  extent  of  the  emperor’s 
expeditions.  Professor  A.  Forke,  of  Berlin,  in  an  ingenious 
attempt  to  explain  the  several  accounts  preserved  in  Chinese 
literature,*  comes  to  the  conclusion  that  Si-wang-mu  is  no 
less  a personage  than  the  Queen  of  Sheba,  and  that  the  em- 
peror’s journeys  took  him  to  her  kingdom  in  Arabia  Felix. 

But  the  name  Si-wang-mu  is  by  no  means  confined  to  the 
lifetime  of  Mu-wang.  For,  apart  from  its  occurrence  in 
later  legends,  the  annals  of  the  Bamboo  Books*  mention 

* Origin  of  Early  Chinese  Civilization,  p.  265  seqq.  ^ Mu  Wang  und 
die  Konigin  von  Saba,  in  Mittheilungen  des  Seminars  fur  Orientalische 
Sprachen  zu  Berlin,  Jahrgang  vii,  1904.  ® Legge,  Shu-king,  Prole- 
gomena, p.  115. 


GRADUAL  DECLINE  OP  CENTRAL  POWER  151 


a visit  of  Si-wang-mu  to  the  Emperor  Shun,  and  Legge, 
following  the  native  commentaries,  explains  the  name  as 
that  of  “a.  state  or  kingdom  in  the  distant  west.”  Cer- 
tainly the  compiler  of  the  Bamboo  Books  cannot  have 
thought  of  the  Queen  of  Sheba,  when  he  connects  the  name 
W'ith  that  of  Shun,  who,  according  to  this  very  source,  should 
be  held  to  have  lived  eleven  hundred  years  before  Mu-wang. 
The  arguments  brought  to  bear  on  the  Si-wang-mu  problem 
by  Forke  are  very  interesting,  but  I cannot,  with  Chavannes, 
make  up  my  mind  to  accept  his  conclusions.  Chavannes  ‘ 
has  devoted  an  excursus  to  “Le  voyage  au  pays  de  Si- 
wang-mou,”  in  which  he  endeavors  to  show  that  the  Mu- 
wang  of  the  Si-wang-mu  legends  is  not  the  emperor  of  that 
name,  but  his  namesake  Duke  Mu,  of  the  state  of  Ts’in,  who 
reigned  from  659  to  621  b.c.^ 

Whichever  view  we  may  adopt,  the  journeys  of  Mu-wang 
seem  to  have  in  no  way  affected  Chinese  civilization.  Sup- 
posing the  emperor  had  actually  reached  the  distant  region 
of  Khotan,  no  one  to-day  can  tell  what  sort  of  people  he 
may  have  found  there,  whether  Indians,  Persians,  or  Tar- 
tars ; and  even  admitting  that  the  illustrious  traveler  may 
have  brought  home  some  strange  impressions  from  his 
interesting  trips  into  the  formerly  unknown  parts  of  cen- 

* Les  Mimoires  historiques,  vol.  v.,  pp.  480-489.  ^ Cf.  Profes- 
sor H.  A.  Giles’s  paper  Who  was  Si  Wang  Mu?  in  his  Adversaria 
Sinica,  no.  1,  Shanghai,  1905,  p.  1;  also  Ed.  Huber’s  notes  on 
Forke’ s work  in  Bulletin  de  V Ecole  Frangaise  d’ Extreme  Orient, 
vol.  iv,  pp.  1127-1131.  Huber  (p.  1128)  justly  draws  attention  to 
the  record  in  the  Bamboo  Books  of  Si-wang-mu’ s visit  to  the 
Chinese  court  “in  the  same  year,”  which  would  involve  the  fact 
that  the  Queen  of  Sheba  was  an  Asiatic  traveler  fully  as  bold  as 
her  friend  Mu-wang.  The  Queen  of  Sheba  theory,  Huber  points 
out  (p.  1131),  had  been  raised  as  early  as  1853  by  Paravey,  though 
rejected  by  Burnouf  and  Von  Humboldt. 


152 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


tral  Asia,  we  fail  to  notice  in  the  development  of  Chinese 
civilization  during  the  Chou  dynasty  any  such  palpable 
proofs  for  the  accession  of  foreign  elements  as  we  can  show 
to  have  been  introduced  about  nine  hundred  years  later 
under  the  Emperor  Wu-ti  of  the  Han. 

Mu-wang  had,  contrary  to  the  opinion  of  his  advisers, 
made  great  preparations  for  a campaign  against  the  K’iian- 
jung,  which  apparently  ended  in  failure.  Altogether  his 
long  reign  did  not  tend  to  strengthen  the  empire.  He  died 
at  the  advanced  age  of  104,  after  a reign  of  fifty-five  years. 

§ 30.  Kung-wang  (946-935  b.c.) 

Mu-wang’s  eldest  son  I-hu  was  himself  seventy-two  years 
of  age  when  he  succeeded  his  father  under  the  style  of  Kung- 
wang.  His  reign,  which  lasted  about  ten  years,  would 
have  been  one  of  perfect  peace  save  for  an  event  casting  a 
slur,  savoring  of  the  scandalous,  on  the  emperor’s  character. 
One  of  his  vassals,  the  duke  of  a little  state  called  Mi,  had 
married  three  women  of  his  own  surname.  This  has  at  all 
times  been  looked  upon  in  China  as  a sort  of  incest,  and  it 
was  also  contrary  to  the  laws  of  the  Chou  dynasty.  Ac- 
cording to  Ssi-ma  Ts’ien,  his  mother  had  reprimanded  him 
on  this  account,  saying:  “You  ought  to  hand  over  your 
wives  to  the  king,  for  as  three  animals  constitute  a flock 
and  three  persons  a meeting,  three  wives  are  a luxury. 
Luxury  is  a fine  thing,  but  not  even  the  emperor  will  take 
three  wives  of  the  same  clan.  If  you  assume  to  do  what 
even  he  is  not  worthy  of,  this  will  be  yom’  end.”  When 
Kung-wang  had  seen  the  duke’s  three  beauties,  he  called 
for  their  delivery  and,  the  women  being  withheld,  the 
emperor  made  war  on  the  duchy  of  Mi  and  destroyed  it. 


GRADUAL  DECLINE  OF  CENTRAL  POWER  153 


It  does  not  appear  from  Ssi-ma  Ts’ien’s  account  for  what 
reason  the  emperor  wanted  the  three  women.  From  other 
accounts  it  would  appear  that  old  man  though  he  w^as  he 
had  fallen  in  love  with  them.‘  Kung-wang  died  at  the 
age  of  eighty-four,  leaving  the  throne  to  his  son  I-wang. 

§ 31.  P-WANG  (934-910  B.c.) 

Ssi-ma  Ts’ien  describes  this  monarch  as  an  incapable  ruler, 
under  whose  government  the  royal  house  rapidly  declined ; 
and  he  insinuates  that  many  of  the  satirical  poems  con- 
tained in  the  Shi-king  referred  to  him.^ 

§ 32.  Hiau-wang  (909-895  b.c.) 

This  is  the  first  monarch  of  the  Chou  dynasty  who  was 
not  the  son  of  his  predecessor.  Hiau-wang,  the  younger 
brother  of  Kung-wang,  usurped  the  government,  the  chil- 
dren of  I-wang  being  too  young  to  succeed  their  father. 
The  most  noteworthy  event  of  his  reign  was  the  elevation 
of  a favorite  by  name  of  Fei-tzi  to  the  rank  of  prince  of 
Ts’in.  Fei-tzi  was  supposed  to  derive  his  pedigree  from 
Po  I,  minister  of  ancestor  worship  imder  the  Emperor 
Shun  in  the  twenty-third  century  b.c.;  but,  his  family 
having  degenerated,  he  was  obliged  to  make  a living  by 
dealing  in  horses.  The  emperor  being  a great  sportsman, 
he  managed  so  to  ingratiate  himself  that  he  became 
chief  equerry  and  finally  rose  to  be  a prince  of  the  em- 
pire. In  the  course  of  centuries  the  duchy  of  Ts’in  grew 
in  power  and  was  destined  after  several  generations  to 
cause  the  downfall  of  the  Chou  empire. 

* De  Mailla,  Histoire  gdnerale  de  la  Chine,  vol.  ii,  p.  11  seqq. 

* His  name  P differs  in  tone  from  that  of  his  son  (§  33). 


154 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


§ 33.  P-WANG  (894-879  b.c.) 

I^-wang  was  the  eldest  son  of  I^-wang,  Hiau-wang’s 
nephew  and  predecessor.  The  tyrannical  temper  of  Hiau- 
wang,  the  uemper,  had  prevented  P-wang’s  character  from 
developing  that  self-consciousness  inseparable  from  the 
dignity  of  a ruler.  Gossip  has  it  that  on  his  first  court 
assembly,  when  the  grandees  and  ministers  of  the  empire 
were  assembled  to  do  him  homage  as  emperor,  he  descended 
from  the  throne  to  salute  his  friends.  The  princes  did  not 
appreciate  this  democratic  familiarity;  on  their  part,  they 
began  to  take  liberties;  discipline  began  to  wane  in  the 
empire,  and  internal  wars  were  the  result. 


§ 34.  Li-wang  (878-842  b.c.) 

Li-wang  tried  to  make  up  for  his  father’s  mildness  by 
excessive  severity ; and  the  result  of  his  unreasonable  tem- 
per was  that  the  imperial  authority  sank  rapidly  into  a 
shadow.  More  than  any  of  his  predecessors,  he  tried  to 
rule  by  force  and  by  terrorizing  the  people;  moreover,  the 
king  was  greedy  for  money,  and  he  favored  such  officials 
as  knew  how  to  extract  it  from  the  people.  The  spirit  of 
independence  which  had  taken  possession  of  the  feudatory 
princes  under  I^-wang  took  more  positive  shape  under  Li- 
wang.  China  now  became  more  and  more  a confederation 
of  smaller  states,  and  the  power  of  the  central  government 
became  more  and  more  nominal  in  spite  of  the  emperor’s 
great  exertions  to  keep  down  every  attempt  at  freedom  on 
the  part  of  his  own  subjects.  Once  in  an  interview  with 
his  chief  minister,  the  Duke  of  Shau,  the  emperor  gave  vent 
to  his  displeasure  because  the  people  sneered  at  his  ways. 


GRADUAL  DECLINE  OF  CENTRAL  POWER  155 


Upon  the  duke’s  remarking  that  it  was  impossible  to  issue 
orders  in  this  connection,  the  emperor  became  furious  and 
sent  for  the  court  wizards,  whom  he  ordered  to  furnish  a 
list  of  those  of  his  subjects  who  had  dared  to  say  evil  things 
about  him.  The  list  being  supplied,  all  the  alleged  slan- 
derers were  executed.  Nobody  henceforth  dared  to  say  a 
word,  for  the  very  streets  had  eyes  to  detect  offenders. 
When  Li-wang  expressed  his  gratification  at  his  success  by 
saying,  “Well,  what  has  become  of  your  gossipers  now?” 
the  duke  is  supposed  to  have  retorted  in  the  famous  speech : 

“All  you  have  brought  about  is  a screen  which  prevents  you 
from  learning  the  real  sentiments  of  the  people;  but  you  should 
know  it  is  more  dangerous  to  shut  the  people’s  mouths  than  to  stop 
the  waters  of  a river.  To  stop  the  progress  of  a river  means  to  force 
it  to  expand,  and  thus  do  more  harm  than  if  it  had  been  allowed 
to  take  its  natural  course.  Such  is  the  case  with  your  people.  If 
you  want  to  prevent  the  damage  threatening  from  the  inundation 
of  a river,  you  have  to  lead  it  into  a proper  bed  which  will  hold  all 
its  waters;  if  you  want  to  make  an  impression  on  the  people,  let 
them  have  perfect  liberty  of  speech.” 

He  then  goes  on  to  explain  why  it  is  the  best  policy  to 
allow  poets,  historians,  and  statesmen  to  speak  out  freely; 
in  fact,  he  places  on  record  all  the  well-known  commonplace 
arguments  brought  forward  against  the  evil  effects  of  too 
much  zeal  in  public  censorship. 

Li-wang’s  speech  has  been  preserved  in  a work  of  doubt- 
ful origin,  said  to  have  been  compiled  during  the  Chou 
dynasty,  entitled  Kuo-yu,  “State  Speeches”  — a typical 
representative  of  quite  a number  of  works  containing 
speeches  ascribed  to  all  possible  historical  personages,  but 
being  probably  nothing  better  than  the  rhetorical  effusions 
of  some  philosopher  who  wished  to  air  his  views  by  pigeon- 


156 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


holing  them  in  his  register  of  historical  anecdotes.  This 
seems,  indeed,  to  be  the  origin  of  a great  deal  of  what  has 
been  handed  down  to  us  as  Chinese  history;  and  in  this 
respect  our  knowledge  of  Chinese  antiquity  is  hardly  better 
than  that  of  ancient  Rome,  whose  history  often  impresses 
one  as  though  it  had  been  expressly  gotten  up  for  the  stage. 
Even  the  Shu-king,  our  oldest  source  for  all  that  precedes 
Confucius,  is  mainly  a series  of  speeches  embodying  political 
and  social  wisdom,  loosely  strung  on  anecdotes,  possibly  in- 
vented for  the  purpose  and  distributed  over  a chronological 
framework  which  may  or  may  not  be  fictitious.  We  have 
seen  that  the  Emperor  Huang-ti  was  credited  with  having 
created  a board  of  historians,  divided  into  a right  and  a left 
wing : the  former  of  which  had  to  record  facts ; the  latter, 
words  and  speeches.  This  is,  of  course,  an  invention  of 
later  ages ; but  it  clearly  indicates  the  method  observed  by 
the  ancient  Chinese  in  constructing  or  reconstructing  their 
most  ancient  history.  The  question  arises  whether  the 
facts  were  not  invented  in  order  to  find  nails  on  which  to 
hang  the  speeches.  The  latter,  divested  of  their  alleged 
historical  background,  might  be  collected  into  a regular 
system  of  political  and  social  philosophy.  Their  associa- 
tion with  the  dramatis  persona  of  the  several  dynasties  and 
reigns,  which  would  otherwise  have  remained  an  uninter- 
esting skeleton  of  names,  gives  life  to  the  lifeless  and  renders 
abstract  theories  more  palatable  to  the  reader.  Professor 
Grube  in  his  History  of  Chinese  Literature  ^ justly  draws 
attention  to  this  peculiarity  of  the  oldest  historical  texts, 
in  which  speeches  preponderate,  whereas  facts  are  referred 
to  in  a mere  casual  manner  in  order,  as  it  were,  to  facilitate 
the  understanding.  The  historical  accounts  of  the  Shu- 
* Geschichte  der  chinesischen  Litteratur,  Leipzig,  1902,  p.  118. 


GRADUAL  DECLINE  OF  CENTRAL  POWER  157 


king,  therefore,  consist  much  more  of  philosophical  col- 
loquies than  of  matters  of  fact. 

Li-wang’s  government  was,  of  course,  not  liked  by  the 
people,  who  broke  out  in  open  rebellion  in  842  b.c.,  and 
forced  the  king  to  spend  the  rest  of  his  days  in  banishment, 
leaving  the  government  to  the  dukes  of  Chou  and  Shau, 
descendants  of  the  great  Chou-kung. 

§ 35.  The  Kung-ho  Period  (841-828  b.c.) 

The  interregnum  during  which  the  two  dukes  conducted 
the  government  on  behalf  of  the  absent  king  was  called 
kung-ho,  which  term  may  be  rendered  by  “common  har- 
mony,” as  alluding  to  the  regency  of  the  two  officials  named 
by  Ssi-ma  Ts’ien.  According  to  the  Bamboo  Books  and 
the  philosopher  Chuang-tzi  (4th  cent,  b.c.),  the  word  Kung- 
ho  represents  a personal  name  of  one  Ho,  Earl  of  Kung, 
which  would  imply  that  he,  and  not  the  two  dukes,  was 
actually  responsible  for  the  government.  \\Tien  the 
popular  indignation  had  grown  into  open  rebellion,  Tsing, 
the  heir  presumptive  to  the  throne,  took  refuge  after  his 
father’s  flight  with  the  Duke  of  Shau,  who  shielded  him 
against  the  revolutionists;  and  when  in  828  b.c.  Li-wang 
died  in  banishment,  Tsing,  who  had  in  the  meantime 
attained  his  majority,  was  proclaimed  king  under  the  name 
of  Siian-wang. 

§ 36.  SuAN-WANG  (827-782  b.c.) 

Under  the  advice  of  the  two  virtuous  dukes  Chou  and 
Shau,  Siian-wang  earned  the  complete  confidence  of  his 
people  as  well  as  of  his  officials,  although  dereliction  of  duty 


158 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


had  repeatedly  brought  on  political  reverses,  which  the 
historians  are  so  fond  of  tracing  back  to  the  rulers’  not  hav- 
ing listened  to  good  advice  before  acting. 

There  was  a time-honored  custom  imder  the  Chou  dynasty 
that  the  emperor  had  to  perform  the  ceremony  of  working 
in  person  in  the  “Fields  of  a Thousand  Acres”  set  aside  for 
the  purpose,  a ceremony  similar  to  the  handling  of  the 
plough  by  the  emperor  at  the  present  day.  Siian-wang 
declined  to  comply  with  the  practice,  in  spite  of  the  re- 
monstrances of  one  of  his  dukes,  with  the  result  that  in 
789  B.c.  his  army  was  defeated  in  a battle  against  certain 
Tangutan  tribes.  The  name  of  the  battle-field,  according 
to  Ssi-ma  Ts’ien,  was  Ts’ien-mou,  which  means  “ a thousand 
acres,”  but  it  would  appear  that  the  name  was  given  to 
that  locality  afterward  in  commemoration  of  the  emperor’s 
disinclination  to  listen  to  his  minister’s  remonstrances. 
Ssi-ma  Ts’ien’s  account  of  Siian-wang’s  reign  is  very  meager, 
and  he  says  nothing  about  any  military  achievements 
against  the  Huns. 

We  learn  much  more  on  this  subject  from  an  ode  in  the 
Shi-king,  which  throws  considerable  light  on  one  of  those 
contests  of  the  Chinese  against  their  old  hereditary  foe,  the 
Hien-yiin,  or  Huns,  in  the  north.  Although  not  a historical 
narrative,  the  Shi-king  serves  occasionally  as  a most  valu- 
able historical  source;  its  odes  probably  existed  genera- 
tions before  Confucius  and  may,  where  facts  of  history  are 
alluded  to,  be  regarded  as  almost  contemporaneous  tradi- 
tion in  poetical  shape.  This  piece  of  ancient  poetry  con- 
tains a lively  account  of  a battle  between  the  Chinese  army 
and  the  Huns  which,  according  to  the  commentators,  took 
place  in  the  first  year  of  Siian-wang’s  reign,  in  July,  827  b.c. 
The  philosopher  Chu  Hi,  in  describing  the  situation  referred 


GRADUAL  DECLINE  OF  CENTRAL  POWER  159 


to  by  the  poet,  says:  “After  Ch’ong-wang  and  K’ang- 
wang  the  house  of  Chou  fell  into  decay.  Li-wang  was  so 
oppressive  that  the  people  drove  him  from  the  capital. 
The  Hien-yiin  then  took  advantage  of  the  internal  disorder 
and  invaded  the  country,  till  on  the  king’s  death  his  son 
Tsing,  known  as  Siian-wang,  succeeded  to  the  throne  and 
despatched  against  them  Yin  Ki-fu,  whose  successful 
operations  were  sung  by  the  writer  of  this  ode.”  ^ This  part 
of  the  Shi-king,  written  by  a poetical  recorder  of  Hunnic 
fighting  living  fully  twelve  hundred  years  before  Priscus 
and  Jordanes,  is  probably  as  valuable  a historical  account 
as  any  of  the  speeches  attributed  to  emperors  .or  ministers 
and  preserved  so  religiously  in  the  Shu-king  and  other 
histories.  I reproduce  the  ode  in  Legge’s  translation : ^ — 

“ In  the  sixth  month  all  was  bustle  and  excitement. 

The  war  carriages  had  been  made  ready, 

With  the  four  steeds  of  each,  strong  and  eager ; 

And  the  regular  accoutrements  had  been  placed  in  the 
carriages. 

The  Hi4n-yun  were  in  blazing  force. 

And  thence  was  the  urgency. 

The  king  had  ordered  the  expedition, 

To  deliver  the  royal  kingdom. 

“Matched  in  strength  were  the  four  black  steeds, 

Well  trained  to  observe  every  rule. 

On  this  sixth  month. 

We  completed  our  accoutrements. 

Our  accoutrements  were  completed, 

And  we  marched  thirty  li  every  day. 

The  king  had  ordered  the  expedition, 

To  help  the  Son  of  Heaven. 


* Cf . Giles,  A Chinese  Biographical  Dictionary,  p.  943,  no.  2485. 

’p.  281. 


160 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


“The  four  steeds  were  long,  and  stout, 

And  large-headed. 

We  smote  the  Hien-yiin, 

And  achieved  great  merit. 

Severely  strict  and  careful  was  our  leader, 

Discharging  his  military  service,  — 

Discharging  his  military  service. 

And  settling  thereby  the  royal  kingdom. 

“ Badly  reckoned  the  Hien-ytin, 

When  they  confidently  occupied  Tsiau  and  Huo 
And  overran  Hau  and  Fang, 

As  far  as  to  the  south  of  the  King. 

On  our  flags  was  our  blazonry  of  birds. 

While  our  white  streamers  fluttered  brightly. 

Ten  large  war  chariots 
Led  the  way  in  front. 

“The  war  carriages  were  well  made. 

Nicely  balanced  before  and  behind. 

Their  four  steeds  were  strong. 

Both  strong  and  well  trained. 

We  smote  the  Hien-yiin, 

As  far  as  T’ai-yiian. 

For  peace  or  for  war  fit  is  Ki-fu, 

A pattern  to  all  the  states. 

“ Ki-fu  feasts  and  is  glad ; 

Great  happiness  is  his. 

In  returning  from  Hau, 

Distant  and  long  had  been  our  march. 

He  entertains  and  feasts  his  friends. 

With  roast  turtle  and  minced  carp. 

And  who  are  there? 

There  is  Chang  Chung,  the  filial  and  brotherly.” 

It  appears  from  this  ode  that  the  Hien-yun  had  made  in- 
roads into  the  very  heart  of  the  Chinese  dominions.  Al- 
though the  several  local  names  mentioned  in  connection 


GRADUAL  DECLINE  OF  CENTRAL  POWER  161 


with  the  territories  as  being  occupied  or  overrun  by  their 
wild  hordes  cannot  now  be  safely  identified,  there  cannot 
be  any  doubt  about  the  river  King,  the  south  of  which 
(not  the  north,  as  Legge  inadvertently  translates)  the 
enemy  had  reached.  The  King  is  an  affluent  joining 
from  the  north  the  river  Wei,  near  the  present  city  of 
Si-an-fu.  We  see  that  Suan-wang’s  army  ‘‘smote  the 
Kien-yun  as  far  as  T’ai-yiian.”  This  shows  that  the  Huns 
even  after  Siian-wang’s  victory  held  the  entire  north  of  the 
Shan-si  province,  the  very  neighborhood  where  in  the 
third  century  b.c.  their  great  monarch  Mau-tun  had  his 
capital.  The  hero  of  this  ode  was  Yin  Ki-fu,  who  is  re- 
peatedly mentioned  in  the  “Book  of  Odes”  as  a military 
leader,  and  who  appears  to  have  had  a confidential  position 
among  the  king’s  surroundings.  In  another  ode ' the 
imperial  troops  are  praised  for  their  deeds  on  returning 
from  an  expedition  against  the  Hien-5uin  under  a general 
who  is  described  as  “the  awe-inspiring  Nan-chung.”  This 
ode  is  generally  referred  to  the  much  earlier  wars  of  Won- 
wang  against  the  Hien-yun,  though  it  may  have  originated 
at  a later  time.  A descendant  of  this  same  Nan-chung 
is  also  mentioned  in  one  of  the  odes  ^ as  a military  leader. 
I am  not  prepared  to  say  in  what  relation  this  man,  whose 
personal  name  was  Huang-fu,  stands  to  the  name  Nan- 
chung  occurring  in  a hieroglyphic  inscription  found  on  the 
celebrated  bronze  tripod,  now  in  the  Buddhist  Monastery 
of  Silver  Island  in  the  Yang-tzi  River,  near  Chinkiang,  and 
of  which  I succeeded  in  taking  a photograph  in  1892.^ 
This  interesting  relic  of  Chinese  ancient  art  has  been  the 
subject  of  several  learned  essays  by  native  archaeologists, 

* Legge,  p.  261  seqq.  ^ Legge,  p.  555.  ^ See  T’oung  pao,  vol.  vii, 
p.  487  seq. 

M 


162 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


who  have  proved  from  the  inscription  that  it  dates  from 
the  year  812  b.c.,  which  falls  in  the  reign  of  Siian-wang. 
This  emperor’s  wars  against  the  Hien-yiin  give  us,  in  con- 
nection with  what  the  bards  of  the  Ski-king  have  to  tell 
about  them,  an  appropriate  idea  of  the  outfit  of  a Chinese 
army  in  those  days.  The  phases  of  pre-Confucian  culture, 
as  described  in  the  several  odes  of  the  Ski-king,  have  been 
collected  and  methodically  arranged  by  Ed.  Biot  in  a paper 
entitled  “Sur  les  moeurs  des  anciens  Chinois,  d’apres  le 
Chi-king,”  ‘ and  reproduced  in  an  English  version  by 
Legge,  in  an  Appendix  to  the  Prolegomena  of  his  edition 
of  the  Ski-king?  While  referring  the  student  to  this  excel- 
lent source  of  our  knowledge  of  the  Chou  culture,  I think 
the  reign  of  the  fighting  emperor  Siian-wang  furnishes  a fit 
opportunity  to  extract  the  most  noteworthy  facts  regarding 
the  manner  in  which  wars  were  conducted  by  the  Chinese 
of  the  Chou  period  generally.  Biot  says : — 

“ It  has  been  said  that  hunting  is  the  image  of  war.  This  com- 
parison becomes  a reality  in  the  deserts  of  North  America  and  Cen- 
tral Asia.  When  the  men  of  one  horde  assemble  and  issue  from 
their  place  of  settlement,  their  association  has  two  simultaneous 
objects : hunting  in  the  vast  steppes  which  have  no  definite  pos- 
sessors, and  war  with  the  other  hordes  which  come  to  hunt  on  the 
same  debatable  ground.  In  the  times  described  in  the  Ski-king 
the  greater  part  of  the  country  surrounding  the  great  cultivated 
valley  of  the  Yellow  River  was  such  a hunting  ground,  undivided 
between  the  Chinese  and  the  indigenous  hordes.  The  Chinese 
armies,  then  led  against  the  barbarians,  hunted  and  fought  by  turns ; 
their  warriors  used  the  same  arms  against  the  enemies  and  against 
the  wild  animals.  Nevertheless,  several  odes  give  the  description 
of  regular  expeditions  directed  by  the  sovereign,  or  by  a Chinese 
feudal  prince  against  another  prince;  several  of  them  depict  the 

* Journal  Asiatique,  4th  series,  vol.  ii,  1843,  pp.  307  seqq.,  430  seqq. 

^ Shi-king,  Prolegomena,  pp.  142-171. 


GRADUAL  DECLINE  OF  CENTRAL  POWER  163 


posts  regularly  established  upon  the  frontiers.  Some  extracts 
from  these  odes  give  an  idea  of  what  was  then  the  art  of  war  in 
China.  . . . 

“The  frontier  posts  between  the  states  at  war  with  one  another, 
or  on  the  borders  of  the  barbarous  regions,  were  supplied  from  the 
peasantry,  and  were  relieved  from  year  to  year ; the  service  at  these 
posts  was  truly  forced,  and  hence  the  lamentations  of  the  soldiers 
who  were  so  stationed.  The  edict  which  enjoined  regular  service 
on  the  frontiers  was  inscribed  on  a bamboo  tablet  placed  at  the 
post.  In  the  Chinese  armies  of  this  epoch,  as  in  the  feudal  armies 
of  our  Middle  Ages,  the  infantry  was  composed  of  husbandmen 
taken  from  their  labors,  and  they  complained  bitterly  of  their  lot, 
especially  when  they  formed  part  of  an  expedition  against  the  bar- 
barous hordes  of  the  north  and  the  south.  They  had  the  greatest 
fear  of  the  Hien-yiin  on  the  north,  known  afterwards  as  the  Hiung- 
nu.  The  principal  element  of  a Chinese  army  was  the  chariot 
drawn  by  four  horses.  It  carried  three  mailed  warriors,  the  officer 
to  whom  it  belonged  being  in  the  middle.  He  had  on  his  right  his 
esquire,  who  passed  to  him  his  arms,  and  on  his  left  the  charioteer. 
A troop  of  soldiers  followed  the  chariot  to  protect  it.  The  term 
' chariot’  was  then  a collective  name  like  ‘ lance  ’ in  our  Middle  Ages. 
The  Li-ki  reckons  for  every  chariot  three  mailed  warriors,  25  foot- 
men in  front  and  at  the  sides  to  guide  the  horses  and  the  chariot, 
and  72  light-armed  foot-soldiers  following.  But  this  number  or 
company  was  never  complete.  . . . The  sovereign  never  marched 
without  a guard  of  2500  men,  called  sfii.  Every  dignitary,  or  great 
officer,  had  an  escort  of  500  men  called  lii.  To  employ  our  military 
terms,  ski  was  a regiment  and  lii  a battalion.  Six  shi,  or  15,000 
men,  formed  an  ordinary  army.  They  distinguished  the  soldiers 
of  the  left  wing  and  the  right,  according  to  the  division  long  used 
in  the  marching  and  encampments  of  the  Tartar  hordes.  An  army 
was  divided  into  three  troops.  . . . The  chief  of  each  corps  had 
his  place  in  the  middle  of  it. 

“The  chariot  of  the  sovereign,  or  of  the  commander-in-chief,  had 
four  or  six  horses,  yoked  abreast.  When  there  were  four  horses, 
which  was  the  ordinary  number,  two  of  them  were  yoked  to  the 
pole,  and  two  to  the  transverse  bar  of  the  chariot.  The  horses 
were  covered  with  mail,  or  protected  by  bucklers.  Those  of  the 


164 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


commanders  had  golden  bits  with  a small  bell  at  each  side  of  the 
bit.  The  reins  were  richly  adorned  and  led  through  rings  of  leather 
on  the  backs  of  the  horses.  The  sides  of  the  chariots  were  covered 
with  boards  as  a defense  against  the  arrows  of  the  enemy.  They 
were  adorned  in  the  inside  with  mats  of  bamboo,  or  embroidered 
carpets.  The  axle-trees  of  the  chariots  of  the  chiefs  were  wrapped 
round  with  green  silk,  or  with  leather,  probably  to  strengthen 
them . The  pole  was  also  covered  with  leather,  painted  in  five  colors. 

“The  princes  and  regular  warriors  wore  helmets.  Those  of  the 
princes  of  the  blood  were  adorned  with  a plume  of  red  silk.  The 
regular  warriors  had  a sword,  two  lances  (or  spears)  and  two  bows. 
The  scabbards  of  the  chiefs’  swords  were  adorned  with  precious 
stones,  or  with  other  ornaments.  The  spears  were  of  three  kinds : 
mau,  which  was  4 meters  long  (20  Chdu  cubits),  and  the  ko, 
16  cubits.  These  were  set  up  in  the  war  chariots.  The  javelin 
was  6 cubits  6 ins.  long,  and  was  used  by  the  foot-soldiers.  All 
the  lances  had  red  pennants  or  streamers. 

“ Like  the  hunting  bows,  those  used  in  war  were  of  wood  adorned 
with  green  silk.  The  bows  of  the  chiefs  had  ornaments  of  ivory. 
There  were  also  bows  of  horn,  or  strong  as  horn,  which  discharged 
several  arrows  at  once.  To  preserve  the  bows,  they  were  kept  in 
cases  of  tiger  skin,  or  of  ordinary  leather.  Every  case  contained 
two  bows,  and  they  were  closely  fitted  to  bamboos,  to  hinder  them 
from  being  warped  by  the  damp.  The  bow-cases  and  the  quivers 
were  made  of  the  skin  of  some  marine  animal  called  yii,  which  may 
have  been  a seal. 

“The  mailed  warriors  had  bucklers  and  battle-axes  with  handles 
of  wood.  The  foot-soldiers  were  usually  armed  only  with  javelins 
and  spears.  The  horses  in  the  chariots  neigh ; the  flags  and  pennons 
wave  in  the  air ; the  foot-soldiers  and  the  assistants  who  guide  the 
horses  march  in  silence.  Besides  the  war  chariots,  there  followed 
the  army  carriages  laden  with  sacks  of  baggage,  and  drawn  by  oxen. 
These  sacks  had  one  or  two  openings,  and  contained  provisions. 
The  chariots  were  unloaded,  and  arranged  around  the  place  of 
encampment.  Then  the  feeble  watched  the  baggage,  while  the 
strong  advanced  against  the  enemy. 

“The  expeditions  against  the  indigenous  tribes  of  the  center, 
the  west,  and  the  north,  were  made  in  the  sixth  moon,  the  time  of 


GRADUAL  DECLINE  OF  CENTRAL  POWER  165 


the  year  corresponding  to  the  end  of  May  and  the  beginning  of 
June.  They  marched  30  li  per  day,  about  11  kilometers,  if  we 
value  the  li  at  1800  cubits  and  10  centimeters  each.  For  a grand 
army  of  300  chariots,  10  chariots  formed  the  advanced  guard. 

“On  the  banners  were  figures  of  birds  and  of  serpents.  There 
were  attached  to  them  little  bells  and  ribbons.  On  the  royal 
standard  there  was  the  image  of  the  sacred  dragon.  The  princes  of 
the  blood,  and  secondary  chiefs  or  viceroys  had  broad  pennons  or 
flags.  One  pennon,  formed  of  an  ox-tail  upon  a pole,  was  placed 
behind  in  the  chariot  of  the  chief  of  a squadron. 

“The  warriors  wore  colored  cuisses,  and  buskins  on  their  legs. 
In  one  of  the  odes  a man  of  Ts’in  engages  another  to  follow  him  to 
the  war  by  the  promise  of  clothes,  shoes,  and  weapons,  should  he 
need  them.  The  commandant  of  a corps  d’armee  had  the  title 
K’i-fu  or  of  Shang-fu.  Several  odes  designate  the  general  by  the 
name  of  ‘the  illustrious  man,’  meaning  ‘the  Prince,’  ‘the  Dignitary.’ 

“The  drum  gave  the  signal  for  departure,  for  attack,  and  for 
retreat.  Large  drums  were  covered  with  the  skin  of  a lizard  called 
t’o.  Before  the  battle,  the  warriors  excited  one  another  by  mock 
combats.  They  leaped,  ran,  and  threatened  one  another  with  their 
weapons. 

“ In  one  of  the  odes.  King  Won  causes  the  assault  of  a fortified 
city,  and  his  soldiers  ascend  the  wall  by  means  of  hooked  ladders. 
He  takes  some  prisoners  and  punishes  them  as  rebels,  proportion- 
ing their  chastisement  to  the  gravity  of  their  offense.  He  causes 
the  left  ears  of  his  captives  to  be  cut  off ; and  in  contenting  himself 
with  this  punishment  he  passes  for  a just  and  humane  man.  In 
the  state  of  Lu  (towards  the  south  of  Shan-tung),  the  army  returns 
from  an  expedition.  They  present  to  the  prince  the  ears  that  have 
been  cut  off ; they  bring  the  captive  chiefs  in  chains  before  the 
judge,  by  whom  they  are  condemned  by  regular  sentence.  Like 
the  tribes  of  America,  the  Chinese  then  made  very  few  prisoners; 
they  put  the  vanquished  chiefs  to  death,  and  released  the  com- 
mon soldiers  after  cutting  off  one  of  their  ears,  as  a mark  of  dis- 
honor, or  that  they  might  recognize  them  if  they  met  with  them 
again. 

“On  the  parade  ground  of  the  capital  they  practised  archery 
and  the  use  of  other  weapons.” 


166 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


This  graphic  description  of  the  Chinese  method  of  war- 
fare under  the  Chou  dynasty  has  been  gathered  from 
numerous  passages  in  the  Shi-king.  It  will  serve  as  an 
example  showing  how  the  old  poetical  literature  fills  a gap 
in  the  historical  tradition  similar  to  that  filled  up  by  the 
Homeric  epics  in  Greek  history.  The  student  will  find 
references  in  detail,  with  some  valuable  critical  notes,  partly 
modifying  the  results  drawn  by  Biot  from  the  Shi-king,  in 
Legge’s  translation. 

From  a military  point  of  view  the  Chinese  method  of 
warfare  does  not  strike  one  as  very  practical,  if  one  con- 
siders that  the  Hien-yiin,  or  Huns,  as  true  sons  of  the 
steppe,  which  they  must  have  been  at  all  times,  ought  to 
have  enjoyed  a great  advantage  in  moving  about  on  their 
fleet  horses  against  an  enemy  possessing  no  cavalry  what- 
ever. Although  the  Chinese  have  been  defeated  here  and 
there  by  the  Huns,  it  appears  that  on  the  whole,  in  spite  of 
their  clumsy  chariot  fighting,  on  roads  which  were  probably 
hardly  any  better  than  those  of  the  present  day,  they  have 
had  on  their  side  greatly  superior  armament  and  a certain 
uniformity  of  organization ; but  their  chief  advantage  dur- 
ing centuries  of  this  warfare  may  have  been  the  fact  that 
the  fighting  took  place  on  hilly  territory,  where  cavalry 
forces  could  not  well  be  displayed,  the  Huns  having  always 
been  more  successful  on  extensive  plains,  like  the  Mon- 
golian steppe,  than  in  alpine  regions,  like  the  north  of 
Shan-si.  When  they  broke  into  Europe  twelve  hundred 
years  after  Siian-wang,  their  first  successes  were  largely 
supported  by  the  conditions  of  the  ground,  those  extensive 
plains  of  southern  Russia,  over  which  they  sent  that  ava- 
lanche of  warlike  hordes,  increasing  their  power  by  forcing 
kindred  folks  into  their  service.  Finally,  we  have  to  con- 


GRADUAL  DECLINE  OF  CENTRAL  POWER  167 


sider  the  probability  that,  during  the  Chou  period,  the  Huns 
had  not  as  yet  consolidated  into  a nation,  whereas  the 
Chinese,  although  a confederation  of  smaller  states  some- 
what like  the  German  empire,  cheerfully  followed  the  call 
of  the  Son  of  Heaven  when  the  nation  was  in  danger. 
With  all  the  welcome  detail  regarding  the  Chinese  side  of 
that  warfare,  the  Shi-king  tells  us  very  little  about  the  Huns 
of  those  days.  The  earliest  account  of  the  gradual  develop- 
ment of  Hunnic  life  has  been  supplied  by  Ssi-ma  Ts’i^n, 
who  probably  reconstructs  his  sketch  of  the  most  ancient 
Huns  from  what  he  had  learned  about  these  nomads  at 
his  own  time,  the  beginning  of  the  first  century  b.c.  Ssi- 
ma  Ts’ien  ‘ gives  us  the  following  account  of  the  oldest 
Hiung-nu. 

“Their  earliest  ancestors  were  the  descendants  of  the 
Emperor  Yu  of  the  Hia  dynasty  and  were  styled  Shun-wei.” 
Parker  suggests  that  this  name  Shun-wei,  which  most  prob- 
ably applies  to  the  chief  of  the  country, — since  not  the 
whole  nation,  but  merely  the  reigning  family  could  have 
descended  from  the  Emperor  Yii,  — is  related  to  an  old 
Chinese  family  name  Shun-yu.  This  seems  quite  possible, 
although  the  Chinese  themselves  derive  it  from  a small 
state  mentioned  in  their  “Spring  and  Autumn  Annals.” 
Since  we  hardly  know  anything  about  the  sounds  of  Chinese 
characters  during  the  Chou  dynasty,  excepting  the  some- 
what doubtful  conclusions  we  may  arrive  at  from  a study 
of  the  rhymes  in  the  Shi-king  odes,  it  may  not  be  too  bold 
a conjecture  if  we  connect  this  title  Shun-wei,  or  Shun-yu, 
with  the  sound  Shan-yu,  by  which  throughout  Chinese  his- 
tory the  supreme  ruler  of  the  Hiung-nu  is  designated. 

^ Shi-ki,  ch.  cx;  cf.  E.  H.  Parker,  The  Turko-Scythian  Tribes,  in 
China  Review,  vol.  xx,  p.  1 seqq. 


168 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


“Before  the  time  of  Yau  and  Shun  there  were  the  Shan-jung, 
the  Hien-yiin  and  the  Hun-yii,  who  occupied  the  northern  de- 
pendencies, following  their  cattle  and  shifting  their  abodes.  Their 
herds  chiefly  consisted  of  horses,  oxen  and  sheep,  these  being  the 
animals  commonly  reared  by  them;  the  camel,  mules  and  other 
equine  animals  [named  in  the  text,  but  difficult  to  identify]  being 
of  less  frequent  occurrence.  Following  their  pasturages,  they  shifted 
about  and  had  neither  cities  and  towns,  or  other  fixed  abodes,  nor 
regular  agriculture,  though  they  divided  their  territories ; they  had 
no  written  documents,  the  spoken  word  being  sufficient  by  way  of 
contract.  From  early  childhood  they  were  taught  to  ride  on  sheep, 
to  draw  the  bow  and  shoot  birds  and  rats;  when  half  grown  they 
would  shoot  foxes  and  hares  as  game  for  food.  Having  grown  to 
become  soldiers,  they  would  thus  become  excellent  archers,  when 
they  were  all  supplied  with  armors  on  horseback.  In  easy  times 
they  would  follow  their  cattle  and  live  on  the  chase,  but  in  times  of 
trouble  every  man  was  trained  to  fight  in  battle  and  ready  to  make 
raids  on  other  lands.  This  was  their  natural  disposition.  For 
distant  fight  their  weapon  was  the  bow  and  arrow;  for  close  fight 
they  used  swords  and  small  spears.  If  they  could,  they  would  go 
on  and  on  in  fighting,  but  withdraw  if  they  were  not  successful. 
They  were  not  ashamed  to  take  to  flight,  and  as  long  as  a matter 
was  of  advantage  to  them,  they  did  not  know  propriety  or  justice. 
From  their  prince  and  king  downward  they  all  lived  on  the  flesh 
of  their  cattle,  using  their  skins  for  clothing  ; they  wore  felt  coats. 
The  able-bodied  would  eat  the  fat  and  dainty  parts  of  meats, 
leaving  the  remnants  of  meals  to  old  folks,  for  they  honored  strong 
and  robust  men,  and  despised  those  that  were  old  and  decrepid. 
The  man  whose  father  had  died  would  marry  his  step-mothers 
(f.e.  his  father’s  own  wives  except  his  own  mother) ; when  a brother 
died  his  consorts  became  the  wives  of  the  surviving  brother.  It 
was  their  custom  not  to  taboo  names ; and  they  had  no  clan  names 
or  by-names.  When  the  Hia  dynasty  became  weak.  Rung  Liu 
[Duke  Liu,  an  ancestor  of  the  Chou  emperors]  had  lost  his  hus- 
bandry-post, he  changed  to  become  a western  Tartar  and  had  his 
city  in  Pin.  Three  hundred  years  after  this,  the  Jung  and  the  Ti 
Tartars  attacked  the  great  king  T’an-fu  [the  grandfather  of  Won- 
wang].” 


GRADUAL  DECLINE  OF  CENTRAL  POWER  169 


I am  inclined  to  assume  from  this  passage  that  the  ances- 
tors of  the  house  of  Chou  had  for  centuries  adopted  semi- 
Tartar  life,  which  supports  the  hypothesis  that  Wu-wang 
brought  about  the  downfall  of  the  Shang  dynasty  with  the 
assistance  of  Hunnic  tribes  and  helps  to  explain  the  use  of 
a Turkish  word  for  the  dagger  handled  by  him  in  giving 
the  body  of  his  enemy  Chou-sin  his  final  coup. 

“T’an-fu  fled  and  went  to  the  foot  of  Mount  K’i,  whither  the  peo- 
ple of  Pin  followed  him  and  founded  a city  which  was  the  beginning 
of  the  state  of  Chou.  Fully  a hundred  years  after  this  the  Duke  of 
the  West  [i.e.  Won-wang]  made  war  on  the  Kun  barbarians,  and  some 
twelve  or  thirteen  years  afterwards  Wu-wang  made  war  on  Chou- 
sin  and  took  up  his  camp  at  the  city  of  Lo  and  again  lived  in  Fong 
and  in  Hau,  and  scattered  and  drove  away  the  Jung  barbarians  to 
the  north  of  the  rivers  King  and  Lo,  from  whence  they  offered 
periodical  tribute,  and  orders  were  given  to  call  them  Huang-fu, 
the  ‘Steppe  Dependency.’ 

“More  than  two  hundred  years  later  the  prestige  of  the  Chou 
dynasty  began  to  decline,  and  when  Mu-wang  made  war  on  the 
K’iian  barbarians,  he  obtained  four  white  wolves  and  four  white 
deer  to  come  back  with.  From  this  time  onward  the  Huang-fu 
did  not  come,  upon  which  Chou  introduced  the  punishment  of 
mutilation  [probably  referring  to  the  habit  of  cutting  off  the  left 
ear  of  prisoners  in  war,  which  thus  seems  to  be  looked  upon  as  an 
act  of  reprisal  for  the  Huns  not  sending  tribute  to  the  Chinese 
court].  Over  two  hundred  years  after  Mu-wang,  Yu-wang  of  the 
Chou  dynasty  had  quarreled  with  the  Marquis  of  Shon  [father  of 
the  legitimate  empress]  on  account  of  his  favorite  sultana  Pau  Ssi.' 
The  Marquis  of  Shon  got  angry  and  formed  an  alliance  with 
the  K’iian  barbarians  and  attacked  and  killed  Yu-wang  of  the 
Chou  dynasty  below  the  Li-shan.  Upon  this  they  seized  certain 
territories  of  the  Chou  and  settled  down  between  the  rivers 

’ Cf.  Chavannes,  Memoires  historiques,  vol.  i,  p.  281 ; also  Giles, 
A Chinese  Biographical  Dictionary,  p.  619,  who  represents  Yu-wang 
as  “King  of  Yu”  in  modern  Chi-li,  though  I do  not  know  on  what  au- 
thority. 


170 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


King  and  Wei,  encroaching  over  and  terrorizing  the  Middle  King- 
dom.” 

The  time  of  Siian-wang  has  been  credited  with  the  pro- 
duction of  a most  interesting  monument  of  Chinese  an- 
tiquity in  the  shape  of  a lengthy  stone  inscription,  the  so- 
called  '‘Stone  Drums  of  the  Chou  Dynasty,”  describing,  as 
Chinese  critics  maintain,  a hunting  expedition  by  the  em- 
peror to  the  neighborhood  of  Mount  K’i,  the  ancestral  home 
of  the  Chou  rulers.  Ever  since  they  were  first  discovered, 
the  ten  stone  slabs  containing  the  remnants  of  these  ancient 
hieroglyphics  have  been  the  subject  of  much  controversy 
among  the  Chinese.  To  understand  the  name  “stone 
drums,”  in  Chinese  sh'i-ku,  it  should  be  known  that  the 
Chinese  include  under  that  term  all  rocks  having  a flat  sur- 
face and  a shape  in  any  way  similar  to  a drum.  Since  their 
first  discovery,  early  in  the  seventh  century  a.d.,  on  what 
must  be  supposed  to  have  been  their  original  site  near  the 
old  Mt.  K’i  in  southwestern  Shen-si,  the  stone  drums  have 
been  shifted  about  a good  deal,  so  that  the  seven  hundred 
characters  which  may  have  constituted  their  original  tenor 
have  dwindled  to  a few  more  than  three  hundred,  the  re- 
mainder being  totally  effaced.  Among  the  many  learned 
opinions  placed  on  record  by  native  archaeologists,  the  most 
noteworthy  seem  to  be  those  of  Ou-yang  Siu,  the  Mommsen 
of  his  time,  the  eleventh  century,  inasmuch  as  he  was  the 
first  historian  and  epigrapher,  who  is  entirely  skeptical  as 
to  its  being  a genuine  document,  and  another  writer  of  the 
Sung  dynasty  who  tries  to  refute  Ou-yang  Siu’s  arguments 
one  by  one.  The  modern  view  among  the  Chinese  au- 
thorities is  in  favor  of  the  inscriptions  being  true  records 
of  the  Siian-wang  period.  This  is  also  the  view  expressed 
by  Dr.  S.  W.  Bushell  in  an  elaborate  essay,  “The  Stone 


GRADUAL  DECLINE  OF  CENTRAL  POWER  171 


Drums  of  the  Chou  Dynasty,”  ‘ who  concludes  his  paper 
by  saying:  “No  motive  has  been  suggested  to  account 
for  forgery  on  so  large  a scale.  If  we  accept  the  train  of 
reasoning  of  Ou-yang,  we  must  reject  all  the  sculptured 
monuments  of  Egypt,  Assyria  and  Persia,  which  have 
been  brought  to  light  in  such  profusion  of  late  years.” 
Chavannes,  while  accepting  the  Stone  Drums  as  a gen- 
uine relic  of  antiquity,  differs  from  the  Chinese  re- 
ceived view  in  ascribing  them  not  to  Siian-wang,  the  em- 
peror, but  to  a king  of  the  Ts’in  state  sometime  about 
300  B.c.=* 


§ 37.  Yu-wang  (781-771  b.c.) 

In  quoting  this  rapid  survey  of  the  oldest  relations  of 
the  Chinese  with  the  neighboring  Huns,  I have  anticipated 
the  troublesome  times  which  followed  the  energetic  Siian- 
wang  under  the  reign  of  his  lascivious  son  Yu-wang.  Siian- 
wang’s  armies  had  fought  successfully  not  only  against  the 
Huns,  but  also  against  the  Man  barbarians  in  the  state  of 
King,  on  the  borders  of  the  Yang-tzi  River,  about  Lake 
Tung-t’ing  and  other  enemies  in  the  east  and  west.  In  all 
directions  the  old  frontiers  of  the  empire  were  maintained 
and  extended  by  him.  Yu-wang  led  a dissolute  life,  and 
his  government  was  oppressive.  Like  several  of  his  prede- 
cessors, he  brought  trouble  on  himself  and  his  country  by 
his  infatuation  for  a woman.  When  he  intended  to  make 
war  on  a small  state  called  Pau,  the  chief  of  that  country 
sent  him  for  his  seraglio  a girl  of  great  beauty,  named  Ssi, 

* Journal  of  the  China  Branch  of  the  Royal  Asiatic  Society,  New 
Series,  no.  8,  pp.  133-159.  * See  M6moires  historiques,  vol.  v,  p. 
488  seq. 


172 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


for  which  reason  she  is  known  as  Pau-ssi,  or  Ssi  of  Pan. 
The  king  became  so  enamored  with  her  that  he  deposed  in 
her  favor  his  legitimate  consort,  who  was  a daughter  of 
the  Marquis  of  Shon.  He  was  weak  enough  to  conform  all 
his  life  to  the  pleasures  of  his  favorite,  who  did  not  seem 
to  appreciate  his  attentions.  She  even  made  him  wait  in 
vain  to  see  her  smile.  Having  allowed  it  to  become  known 
that  the  sound  of  the  tearing  of  silk  was  a particularly 
pleasant  noise  to  her,  the  emperor  caused  many  fine  pieces 
of  precious  texture  to  be  torn  up  to  gratify  her  whim ; but 
even  this  failed  to  bring  the  desired  smile.  She  wished  for 
a greater  sacrifice,  and  what  seemed  to  her  a good  practical 
joke  was  actually  carried  out:  Huge  beacon  fires,  w'hich 
had  been  agreed  upon  to  serve  as  a signal  to  the  emperor’s 
vassals  to  come  with  their  troops  to  his  rescue  in  time  of 
danger,  were  lighted.  The  princes  promptly  responded, 
and  the  frivolous  queen  laughed  at  them.  She  little 
thought,  however,  how  dangerous  it  is  to  cry  “wolf!” 
without  need.  When,  later  on,  the  Huns  made  renewed 
inroads,  the  beacon  signals  were  lighted  in  earnest,  but  the 
feudal  princes,  without  whose  assistance  the  king  was  at 
the  mercy  of  the  enemy,  thinking  that  they  might  again 
be  the  victims  of  a hoax,  failed  to  obey  the  summons,  which 
led  to  Yu-wang’s  ruin.  Ssi-ma  Ts’ien  places  the  time  of 
Yu-wang’s  being  first  enthralled  by  his  mistress  in  the 
third  year  of  his  reign  (779  b.c.).  The  emperor  had  by 
her  a son  named  Po-fu;  hence  the  wish  of  the  unworthy 
couple  to  depose  the  legitimate  consort  as  mother  of  the 
heir  to  the  throne.  This  caused  the  court  astronomer 
Po-yang  to  predict  the  downfall  of  the  dynasty;  and  good 
reason  he  had  for  his  prediction,  if  we  view  things  through 
the  eyes  of  an  ancient  Chinese  philosopher.  For  nature 


GRADUAL  DECLINE  OF  CENTRAL  POWER  173 


itself  began  to  show  warnings  of  all  sorts.  An  earthquake 
created  alarm  among  the  people;  a famine  throughout  the 
empire  was  interpreted  as  the  immediate  punishment  of 
Heaven  for  Yu-wang’s  evil  ways ; but  the  most  portentous 
of  all  Heaven’s  warnings  was  an  eclipse  of  the  sun.  Re- 
garding this  eclipse,  in  connection  with  the  other  public 
misfortunes  that  had  befallen  the  empire,  we  possess  an 
ode  of  the  SKi-king,^  which  proves  to  be  a historical  docu- 
ment of  the  greatest  value.  It  says ; — 

“At  the  conjunction  of  the  sun  and  moon  in  the  tenth  month, 

On  the  first  day  of  the  moon,  which  was  sin-mau, 

The  sun  was  eclipsed, 

A thing  of  very  evil  omen. 

Then  the  moon  became  small, 

And  now  the  sun  became  small. 

Henceforth  the  lower  people 
Will  be  in  a very  deplorable  case. 

“ The  sun  and  moon  announce  evil. 

Not  keeping  to  their  proper  paths. 

All  through  the  kingdom  there  is  no  proper  government, 

Because  the  good  are  not  employed. 

For  the  moon  to  be  eclipsed 
Is  but  an  ordinary  matter. 

Now  that  the  sun  has  been  eclipsed,  — 

How  bad  it  is ! 

“ Grandly  flashes  the  lightning  of  the  thunder ; — 

There  is  a want  of  rest,  a want  of  good. 

The  streams  all  bubble  up  and  overflow. 

The  crags  on  the  hill-tops  fall  down. 

High  banks  become  valleys ; 

Deep  valleys  become  hills. 

Alas  for  the  men  of  this  time ! 

How  does  the  king  not  stop  these  things? 

‘ Legge,  p.  320. 


174 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


“Huang-fu  is  the  president; 

Fan  is  the  minister  of  instruction ; 

Kia-po  is  the  chief  administrator; 

Chung-ytin  is  the  chief  cook ; 

Tsou  is  the  recorder  of  the  interior; 

K'ui  is  master  of  the  horse ; 

Yii  is  captain  of  the  guards; 

And  the  beautiful  wife  blazes,  now  in  possession  of  her  place.” 

This  ode,  of  which  I have  quoted  the  first  four  stanzas 
in  Legge’s  translation,  has  for  its  subject  the  lamentation 
of  one  of  the  emperor’s  officials  living  in  an  out-of-the-way 
quarter  of  the  empire,  alone  and  sorrowful  over  the  sad 
corruption  into  which  the  empire  had  sunk.  If  we  hesi- 
tate in  accepting  the  identification  of  the  date  of  the 
eclipse  under  Chung-k’ang  in  2165  b.c.,  there  cannot  be 
any  doubt  as  to  the  one  referred  to  in  this  ode.  The  tenth 
month  and  first  day  of  the  moon,  designated  by  the  cyclical 
characters  sin-mau  of  the  Chou  calendar,  correspond  to 
August  29,  776  b.c.  (not  775;  Dr.  Chalmers,  and  with  him 
Legge  and  other  Sinologues,  make  a mistake  of  one  year  in 
all  their  chronological  statements  by  not  counting  the  year 
of  Christ’s  birth  as  1 b.c.).*  This  fact,  highly  important  in 
calling  Heaven  itself  as  a witness  in  confirming  the  reliance 
we  may  place  in  this  early  period  of  Chinese  history,  has 
been  pointed  out  without  contradiction,  as  far  as  I am 
aware,  from  either  Sinologues  or  astronomers  by  the  Jesuit 
Father  Amiot  in  his  celebrated  paper  on  “The  Antiquity 
of  the  Chinese  proved  by  their  Monuments.”  ^ The  coin- 
cidence of  the  two  dates  proves  beyond  a doubt  that  the 
opinion  of  Chinese  commentators,  who  described  this  ode 

* Arendt,  Synchronistische  Regententabellen,  p.  196.  * Mimoires 

concernant  les  Chinois,  vol.  ii,  Paris,  1777,  p.  99  seqq. 


GRADUAL  DECLINE  OF  CENTRAL  POWER  175 


as  applying  to  Yu-wang  on  the  ground  of  circumstantial 
evidence,  must  be  correct.  It  is,  according  to  all  the 
Chinese  chronological  authorities,  the  sixth  year  of  Yu- 
wang’s  reign ; and  this  is,  indeed,  as  Legge  says,  “ the  earli- 
est date  in  Chinese  history  about  which  there  can  be  no 
dispute.”  Previous  dates  have  been  arrived  at  by  compu- 
tation. This  should  not  involve  that  the  historical  period 
begins  as  late  as  Yu-wang’s  reign,  as  Mayers  seems  to  assume 
in  his  Chronological  Tables.  Doubts  may  be  justified,  it 
is  true,  as  far  as  exact  chronology  is  concerned;  but  we 
have  in  this  case  to  distinguish  between  chronology  and 
history.  We  have  seen  that  the  main  two  sources  of  the 
former,  the  standard  reckoning  and  the  Bamboo  Book 
Annals,  show  considerable  deviations  from  each  other,  in- 
creasing as  we  go  back  to  the  earliest  times  and  amounting 
to  more  than  two  hundred  years  under  Huang-ti,  but  dis- 
appearing altogether  with  the  end  of  Li-wang’s  reign 
(842  B.C.).  If  such  solar  eclipses  as  ought  to  have  been 
visible  in  China  previous  to  Yu-wang’s  time  are  not  men- 
tioned in  the  early  Chinese  history,  otherwise  so  conscientious 
in  placing  on  record  astronomical  facts,  the  reason  may  be, 
as  Amiot  has  pointed  out,  that  they  occurred  when  cloudy 
weather  made  their  observation  impossible.  I,  therefore, 
see  no  reason  why  we  should  not  date  the  commencement 
of  the  historical  period,  as  far  as  the  main  facts  are  con- 
cerned, many  generations  before  Yu-wang,  while  making 
allowance  for  doubts  in  the  chronology  owing  to  the  two- 
fold tradition.  The  dates  of  the  Bamboo  Books  will  be 
found  in  Arendt’s  Table.  The  differences  in  the  begin- 
nings of  the  main  periods  are  shown  in  the  following 
extract : — 


176 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


Standard  Chronology  Bamboo  Books 


B.C. 

B.C. 

Huang-ti 

2704 

2491 

Yau 

2357 

2145 

Shun 

2258 

2045 

Yu  ... 

2205 

1989 

Chung-k’ang  . 

2159 

1952 

Ch’ong-t’ang  . 

1766 

1558 

Chou-sin 

1154 

1102 

Wu-wang 

1122 

1050 

Mu-wang 

1001 

962 

Li-wang 

878 

853 

Kung-ho  period 

841 

It  seems  strange  that  the  two  divergent  chronologies 
should  harmonize  just  at  the  commencement  of  the  Kung-ho 
period,  the  name  of  which,  we  have  seen,  was  interpreted 
in  a twofold  sense.  Is  it  possible  that  neither  of  the  inter- 
pretations is  correct,  and  that  the  term  Kung-ho,  “ common 
harmony,”  refers  to  the  end  of  the  discord  among  chronolo- 
gists,  signalized  by  the  first  year  of  this  period  ? 

We  have  seen  from  the  Shi-king  that  the  beautiful  Pau- 
ssi  was  “in  possession  of  her  place”  at  the  emperor’s  side 
in  the  sixth  year  of  his  reign.  The  legend,  if  it  may  be  so 
called,  of  her  having  lighted  the  beacons  to  make  fools  of 
the  feudatory  princes  would,  therefore,  seem  to  fall  in  the 
years  following  the  eclipse.  Certainly  the  punishment  for 
it,  ending  with  Yu-wang’s  destruction,  belongs  to  the  year 
771  B.C.,  as  the  last  year  of  his  reign.  Ssi-ma  Ts’ien  does 
not  mention  the  eclipse  referred  to  in  the  SM-king;  but  he 
has  preserved  fuller  details  about  the  beacon  affair.  It 
appears  that  Yu-wang  himself  had  made  the  arrangement 
of  a fire  beacon,  or  pyre,  being  lighted  “ when  the  big  drum 
announced  the  approach  of  an  enemy,”  the  smoke  of  which 


GRADUAL  DECLINE  OF  CENTRAL  POWER  177 


was  to  serve  as  a signal  in  the  daytime,  whereas  the  flames 
were  visible  at  long  distance  at  night,  the  beacons  being 
placed  on  the  summits  of  the  hills.  The  Marquis  of  Shon, 
father  of  the  legitimate  empress,  of  course,  resented  the 
treatment  his  daughter  and  grandson  had  received  at  the 
hands  of  Yu-wang  and  his  ambitious  minion.  In  his  dis- 
tress he  had  allied  himself  with  the  K’iian  barbarians  (Huns) 
to  attack  the  emperor.  The  signal  beacons  were  lighted, 
but  no  soldiers  came  to  the  rescue.  Yu-wang  was  killed 
by  the  Huns,  who  also  carried  away  Pau-ssi  and  plundered 
the  imperial  treasury. 


§ 38.  P’iNG-WANG  (770-720  b.c.) 

After  the  fall  of  Yu-wang  the  feudal  lords  arranged  with 
the  Marquis  of  Shon  that  the  late  emperor’s  legitimate  son 
I-kiu,  who  had  been  staying  with  the  marquis,  should  be 
raised  to  the  throne,  and  he  occupied  it  under  the  name  of 
P’ing-wang,  — Ssi-ma  Ts’i4n  says,  “in  order  that  he  might 
be  charged  with  the  sacrifices  of  the  Chou  dynasty.”  Tliis, 
it  appears,  was  henceforward  the  most  important  duty  of 
the  Chou  emperors,  who,  with  the  great  respect  for  legiti- 
macy characterizing  the  Chinese,  were  required  to  see  that 
sacrifices  were  duly  offered  to  their  distinguished  fore- 
fathers. But  that  is  all;  the  real  power  went  more  and 
more  into  the  hands  of  the  emperor’s  vassals.  P’ing-wang, 
feeling  the  weakness  of  his  dominions  in  the  western  por- 
tions, owing  to  their  being  so  much  exposed  to  the  attacks 
of  the  barbarians,  removed  his  capital  to  the  city  of  Lo, 
previously  known  as  Tung-tu,  i.e.  eastern  capital.*  P’ing- 

* This  city,  known  also  as  Lo-yang,  the  present  Ho-nan-fu,  was  also 
the  capital  of  the  eastern  Han  dynasty. 


N 


178 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


wang’s  reign,  according  to  Ssi-ma  Ts’ien,  is  characterized 
by  the  rapid  decline  of  the  imperial  power  in  favor  of  the 
rising  influence  of  feudal  states.  Among  the  latter  Ssi-ma 
Ts’ien  mentions  especially  those  of  Ts’i,  Ch’u,  Ts’in,  and 
Tsin,  which  treated  the  emperor  more  and  more  as  a 
nonentity,  and  the  lords  of  which  held  the  leadership  each 
in  his  own  sphere. 

It  is  perhaps  characteristic  that  under  the  reign  of  P’ing- 
wang  an  important  change  takes  place  in  our  historical 
sources.  The  Shu-king  closes  here  its  account  of  the  Chou 
emperors,  which  is  merely  a collection  of  documents  or 
speeches  placed  on  record  as  being  attributed  to  kings  and 
other  historical  personages,  and  contains  important  lacunae 
for  long  periods,  during  which  nothing  remarkable  is  re- 
corded. Legge  ' says  with  regard  to  this  gap  in  the  Shu- 
king:  — 


“This  fact  is  sufficient  to  prove  that  Confucius  did  not  compile 
the  Shu  as  a history  of  his  country,  or  even  intend  that  it  should 
afford  materials  for  such  a history.  His  design,  we  may  rather 
judge,  was  to  bring  together  such  pieces  as  might  show  the  wonder- 
ful virtue  and  intelligence  of  ancient  sovereigns  and  statesmen, 
who  should  be  models  for  those  of  future  ages,  but  between  P’ing- 
wang  and  Mu-wang  there  had  reigned  seven  sovereigns  of  the  house 
of  Chou;  and  it  is  remarkable  that  not  a single  document  of  the 
reign  of  any  of  them  was  incorporated  by  Confucius  into  the  Shu- 
king.  Indeed,  Wu-wang,  the  first  of  the  sovereigns  of  Chou,  had 
no  successor  equal  to  himself ; and  but  for  his  brother,  the  Duke  of 
Chou,  the  dynasty  would  have  come  to  an  early  end.  There  was  a 
constant  degeneration  after  K’ang-wang.  Its  progress  was  now 
and  then  temporarily  but  feebly  arrested.  Power  and  influence 
passed  with  a steady  progress  from  the  imperial  court  to  one  feu- 

‘ Shu-king,  p.  613,  in  a footnote,  the  substance  of  which  is  repro- 
duced above. 


GRADUAL  DECLINE  OF  CENTRAL  POWER  179 


datory  and  another,  till  in  the  time  of  Confucius  himself  the  suc- 
cessors of  Wu-wang  were  hardly  more  than  shadows  of  an  empty 
name." 

The  removal  of  P’ing-wang’s  capital  to  the  east  marks  a 
new  epoch  in  the  history  of  the  Chou  dynasty.  Chinese 
historians  speak  up  to  this  time  of  the  Si-ch6u,  i.e.  the 
"Western  Chou,"  and  from  P’ing-wang  downward  as  the 
Tung-chdu,  or  "Eastern  Chou.”  It  is  a remarkable  coinci- 
dence that  from  this  time  also  dates  the  period  described 
in  another  historical  classic  compiled  by  Confucius  under 
the  name  of  Ch'un-ts’iu,  "Spring  and  Autumn  Annals,” 
which  no  longer  describes  the  history  of  the  house  of  Chou 
as  that  of  the  imperial  dynasty,  but  that  of  a vassal  state 
called  Lu,  covering  certain  territories  in  the  west  of  the  pres- 
ent province  of  Shan-tung  and  being  the  sage’s  native  coun- 
try. Such  as  they  are,  the  "Spring  and  Autumn  Annals” 
contain  the  history  of  twelve  dukes  of  Lu,  extending  from 
722  to  481  B.c.  Confucius  is  supposed  to  have  compiled 
them  from  records  made  in  connection  with  the  ducal 
court  of  Lu.  The  main  text  of  the  work  is  confined  to  the 
briefest  possible  notices  of  the  chief  events ; but  it  has  been 
extended  by  three  early  commentaries,  the  most  notable 
of  which  is  that  of  Tso-k’iu  Ming,  a personage  of  doubtful 
identification,  possibly  a disciple  of  Confucius  himself.  It 
is  known  and  much  quoted  under  the  name  of  Tso-chuan. 
The  Tso-chuan  is  our  principal  source  for  the  period  covered 
by  the  " Spring  and  Autumn  Annals.”  The  latter  itself  con- 
tains scarcely  enough  detail  to  make  up  a history,  whereas 
the  commentary  throws  important  light  not  only  on  events 
connected  with  the  state  of  Lu,  but  also  on  the  history 
of  other  states  and  of  the  imperial  house.  The  author 
has  been  at  great  pains  to  collect  information  apart  from 


180 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


the  ducal  records,  so  that  Legge  ‘ justly  says  of  this 
work : — 

“The  events  and  the  characters  of  the  time  pass  as  in  reality 
and  life  before  us.  In  no  ancient  history  of  any  country  have  we 
such  a vivid  picture  of  any  lengthened  period  of  its  annals  as  we 
have  from  Tso  of  the  270  years  which  he  has  embraced  in  his 
work.” 

Two  other  commentaries  on  the  "Spring  and  Autumn 
Annals”  exist;  namely,  those  of  Kung-yang  Kau  and  Ku- 
liang  Ch’i,  both  of  whom  lived  in  the  fifth  century  b.c.,  but 
were  probably  somewhat  more  recent  than  Tso-k’iu  Ming. 
The  Tso-chuan,  however,  is  not  only  the  most  complete,  but 
probably  also  the  most  reliable  of  the  three,  although,  as  is 
the  case  with  many  of  the  works  of  the  Chou  dynasty  which 
have  seen  the  light  after  the  Confucian  Classics,  it  has  gone 
through  the  purgatory  of  philological  treatment  at  the  hands 
of  native  scholars  of  the  Han  dynasty,  who  are  responsible 
for  interpolations  and  additions  easily  distinguishable  from 
the  purely  historical  substance  as  philosophical  reflections 
or  ex  post  facto  predictions.  When  compared  with  the 
Tso-chuan  commentary,  the  Ch'un-ts'iu  itself  appears  as  a 
work  unworthy  of  a great  historian ; and  doubts  have  been 
entertained  whether  Confucius  must  be  really  regarded  as 
its  author.  If  the  great  sage  is  really  responsible  for  it, 
he  must  have  had  special  reasons  for  leaving  it  with  all 
the  imperfections  pointed  out  by  later  critics.  The  high 
reputation  which  the  work  has  at  all  times  enjoyed  among 
Chinese  scholars  is  apparently  due  to  the  personal  admira- 
tion in  which  the  great  teacher  was  held  by  his  nation. 
Confucius  was  not  a writer.  The  Ch'un-ts’iu  is  the  only 


Ch’  un-ts’  iu,  Prolegomena,  p.  28. 


GRADUAL  DECLINE  OF  CENTRAL  POWER  181 


work  the  actual  authorship  of  which  is  attributed  to  him, 
if  we  accept  the  doubts  expressed  as  to  his  fatherhood  of 
the  Shu-king,  and  if  we  regard  his  connection  with  the  Shl- 
king  as  merely  an  editorial  one.  His  greatness,  like  that 
of  Socrates,  consisted  more  in  his  personality  and  the 
teachings  among  his  friends  than  in  his  writings,  and  if 
Mencius  ' quotes  him  as  having  said,  “It  is  the  ‘Spring  and 
Autumn’  which  will  make  men  know  me;  and  it  is  the 
' Spring  and  Autumn  ’ which  will  make  men  condemn  me,” 
he  clearly  refers  to  his  political  views,  and  not  to  his  position 
as  an  educator  of  his  nation.  Possibly  the  work  has  not 
come  down  to  us  in  its  original  shape.  Professor  Grube,  in  a 
judicious  essay  on  this  vexed  question  of  Chinese  literature,^ 
takes  into  consideration  the  possibility  that  both  the  Ch’un- 
tsHu  and  its  commentary,  the  Tso-chuan,  were  the  work  of 
Confucius ; and  if  we  have  to  make  allowance  for  the  text  of 
the  latter  having  been  tampered  with  by  the  Han  editors, 
the  occasional  contradictions  which  may  appear  in  the  two 
texts  in  their  present  shape  need  not  prevent  us  from  mak- 
ing such  a sympathetic  compromise. 

§ 39.  Geography  of  the  Ch’un-ts’iu  Period 
(722-481  B.c.) 

If  we  glance  at  a historical  map  of  Germany  during  the 
Thirty  Years’  War,  and  if  we  recall  the  changes  it  under- 
went both  before  and  after  that  period  within  the  space  of 
about  two  centuries  and  a half,  corresponding  in  duration 
to  the  Ch’un-ts’iu  period,  we  may  comprehend  the  diffi- 
culty, not  to  say  impossibility,  of  furnishing  a synoptic 
view  of  the  numerous  states  constantly  at  war  with  each 

* Legge,  p.  157.  ’ Geschichte  der  chinesischen  Litteratur,  p.  68  seqq. 


182 


THE  ANCIENT.  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


other,  falling  under  the  nominal  sway  of  the  Chou  dynasty. 
Each  generation  of  those  days  presents  a different  view. 
The  geography  of  the  Ch6u-li,  with  its  nine  provinces,  or 
ch6u,  bearing  such  close  resemblance  to  the  divisions  of  the 
empire  under  the  Great  Yii,  is  a simple  affair  when  com- 
pared with  that  multiplicity  of  states  which  began  to  grow 
up  from  small  beginnings,  some  of  them  attaining  great 
power,  others  being  short-lived  and  swallowed  up  by  their 
neighbors.  Their  development  in  history  may  be  traced 
in  the  Tso-chuan ; but  as  affecting  the  history  of  China  at 
large,  I shall  mention  only  the  more  important  ones  among 
them.  Students  who  care  for  further  detail  will  find  it  in 
Legge’s  edition  of  the  historical  classic  itself. 

The  development  of  supremacy  among  certain  states, 
nominally  coming  within  the  jurisdiction  of  the  emperor, 
is  probably  to  a large  extent  the  result  of  their  geographical 
position.  The  states  occupying  the  eastern  part  of  the 
empire  were  naturally  prevented  from  expansion  by  their 
being  situated  so  close  to  the  sea-coast ; those  in  the  north, 
west,  and  south  had  the  opportunity  to  join  arms  with 
rude  but  warlike  neighbors,  whose  territories,  by  force  or 
persuasion,  they  managed  to  incorporate  into  their  own 
dominions,  allowing  their  populations  to  amalgamate, 
spreading  Chinese  civilization  among  them,  while  profiting 
by  their  warlike  spirit.  The  states  which  most  benefited 
by  such  a conjuncture  were  those  of  Tsin,  Ts’in,  and  Ch’u. 
The  first  two  names,  so  similar  in  sound,  should  not  be  con- 
founded with  each  other;  the  initial  of  the  tsin  (without 
an  apostrophe)  being  comparatively  soft,  whereas  ts’in  is 
pronounced  with  a hard  explosive  almost  approaching  an 
aspirate.  The  countries  represented  by  these  names  were 
next-door  neighbors  and  occupied  the  entire  northwest  of 


GRADUAL  DECLINE  OF  CENTRAL  POWER  183 


the  present  empire.  Tsin  held  the  greater  part  of  the 
present  province  of  Shan-si  and  the  adjoining  portion  of 
Chi-li  with  that  portion  of  Shen-si  which  lay  on  and  near 
the  opposite  shore  of  the  Yellow  River.  The  large  tract  of 
country  west  of  it,  comprising  that  fertile  valley  of  the  Wei 
River  with  a number  of  seats  of  the  ancient  Chinese  civili- 
zation, had  from  small  beginnings  grown  into  the  dominion 
of  the  Ts’in  state.  Both  these  states  had  for  centuries 
to  do  all  the  fighting  for  the  Chinese  of  the  interior  against 
their  northern  and  western  enemies,  the  Huns,  whose  several 
divisions  are  mentioned  under  various  names,  as  we  have 
seen.  The  result  of  this  fighting  was  the  gradual  increase 
of  their  military  strength.  We  have  seen  how  the  ancestors 
of  the  Chou  emperors  originally  also  occupied  a small  terri- 
tory on  the  western  frontier,  and  how  the  warlike  spirit 
and  the  virtue  of  their  rulers  was  exercised  and  fostered 
by  their  having  to  do  the  fighting  for  that  lazy  and  voluptu- 
ous court  of  the  decadent  Shang  dynasty ; also,  how  thereby, 
from  small  beginnings,  the  dukes  of  Chou  had  grown  so 
powerful  that  with  the  assistance  of  Huns  and  other 
boundary  tribes  they  managed  to  throw  the  Shangs  out 
of  the  field,  whose  last  scion  they  placed  in  charge  of  the 
kingdom  of  Corea  as  a vassal  state. 

The  states  of  Tsin  and  Ts’in  and  their  great  rival  in  the 
south,  the  state  of  Ch’u,  now  tried  with  the  assistance  of 
the  foreign  elements  on  the  boundary  to  make  use  of  the 
weakness  of  the  imperial  court  to  increase  their  power. 
Who  those  foreigners  were  is,  of  course,  not  an  easy  ques- 
tion to  decide.  If  I speak  of  the  neighbors  of  Tsin  and 
Ts’in  as  “Huns,”  I wish  this  term  to  be  understood  in  its 
broadest  sense.  The  Huns  that  broke  into  Europe  in  the 
fourth  century  a.d.  should  be  looked  upon  as  a political, 


184 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


and  not  a racial,  union.  The  Huns  proper,  as  the  dominant 
race,  were  probably  of  Turkish  extraction.  So  were 
the  Hiung-nu,  their  predecessors  in  the  east.*  But  the 
Hiung-nu,  as  a political  power,  comprised,  besides  the 
Turkish  elements  among  central  Asiatic  nations,  also 
the  ancestors  of  the  races  which  we  now  separate  from  them 
as  being  of  Mongolic  and  Tungusic  extraction.  It  is  quite 
probable  that  the  different  tribes  of  the  north  and  west  of 
China  whose  names  appear  in  the  history  of  the  Ch’un- 

* Quite  a niunber  of  arguments  support  this  hypothesis.  The  dis- 
covery and  decipherment  of  the  Old-Turkish  stone  inscriptions  found 
on  the  banks  of  the  Orchon  and  of  the  Tonjukuk  inscription  found  near 
Urga  leave  not  the  slightest  doubt  that  the  language  in  which  they  are 
written  is  Turkish.  There  can,  further,  be  no  doubt  whatever  that 
the  two  allied  nations,  the  Turk  and  Sir-Tardush,  a portion  of  whose 
history  is  described  in  those  inscriptions,  are  identical  with  the  na- 
tions called  T’u-kue  and  Sie-yen-t’o  respectively  in  Chinese  records, 
both  of  whom  are  distinctly  stated  to  have  been  offshoots  of  the  old 
Hiung-nu.  Similarly  the  nation  described  by  the  Chinese  as  Kau-kil, 
which  we  know  to  be  identical  with  the  Uigurs,  one  of  the  chief  repre- 
sentatives of  the  Turkish  stock  during  the  Middle  Ages,  is  stated  in 
Chinese  accounts  as  considering  the  Hiung-nu  as  their  ancestors. 
They  were  even  said  to  speak  the  language  of  these,  their  forefathers, 
with  but  slight  differences  occasioned  by  the  lapse  of  centuries. 
This  may  account  for  the  fact  that  many  of  the  Hiung-nu  words,  of 
which  the  approximate  sound  and  the  meaning  have  been  preserved 
in  Chinese  contemporaneous  records,  are  easily  explained  by  the  cor- 
responding words  in  the  Uiguric  vocabulary  or  that  of  its  modern 
representatives  such  as  the  Turki,  Djagatai,  or  Teleutic  dialects. 
The  only  conclusion  we  can  draw  from  these  considerations  is,  that  the 
Hiung-nu,  or  Huns,  were  actually  Turks  in  a racial  sense,  whatever 
the  other  nations  may  have  been,  whether  Mongols  or  Tunguses, 
who  were  forced  to  join  arms  with  them  and  formed  part  of  the 
Hiung-nu,  or  Huns,  as  a 'political  union.  The  identity  of  the  Huns 
of  Europe  and  the  Hiung-nu  of  Chinese  historians,  denied  by  R6musat 
and  Ritter,  has  been  proved  in  my  paper  Ueher  Wolga-Hunnen  und 
Hiung-nu  (Sitzungsberichte  der  philos.-philol.  Classe  der  k.  layer. 
Akademie  d.  Wissensch.,  1899,  Band  ii.  Ease,  ii,  Miinchen,  1900). 


GRADUAL  DECLINE  OF  CENTRAL  POWER  185 


ts’iu  period  were  just  as  different  in  race  and  language  as 
they  are  nowadays,  and  that  it  was  merely  their  nomadic 
life  and  a certain  uniformity  in  social  organization  which 
united  them  into  one  group.  In  the  Tso-chuan  these 
northern  and  western  barbarians  appear  under  various 
names,  which  now  take  the  place  of  the  former  Hun-yii 
and  Hien-yiin,  the  Huns  of  the  earliest  periods,  with  whom 
they  are  identified  by  the  later  Chinese  historians.  As 
falling  within  this  category,  we  may  regard  the  hordes 
described  in  the  Tso-chuan  as  Jung,  Ti,  and  7.  The  Jung 
were  chiefly  found  in  the  west,  the  Ti  in  the  north,  and  the 
/ in  the  east  of  the  present  Chinese  dominions.  We  know 
nothing  about  their  relations  with  the  inhabitants  of  the 
more  distant  parts  of  the  Asiatic  continent;  and  if  they 
had  anything  in  common  with  the  earliest  Scythians,  which 
have  become  more  or  less  imperfectly  known  in  Europe, 
such  a supposition  can  only  rest  on  conjecture.  Their  be- 
ing mentioned  under  so  many  different  names  seems  to 
show  that  in  the  earliest  times  they  did  not  form  a polit- 
ical union,  as  they  certainly  did  at  the  end  of  the  third  cen- 
tury B.C.,  when  Mau-tun, — which  name  I have  endeavored 
to  explain  as  the  old  Chinese  transcription  of  Turkish 
Baghatur,  “ valiant,”  “ hero,”  — as  Great  Khan  of  the  Hiung- 
nu  nation,  united  under  his  scepter  the  Tartars  of  all  races 
between  Manchuria  in  the  east  and  Lake  Aral  in  the  west. 

An  old  Latin  chronicle,  the  “Chronica  Hungarorum,”  by 
John  of  Thurocz,  who  probably  wrote  about  the  year  1490, 
has  placed  on  record  a list  consisting  of  thirty-seven 
names  said  to  represent  King  Attila’s  ancestors.'  We 

* Hirth,  Sinologische  Beitrage  zur  Geschichte  der  Tiirkvolker: 
I.  Die  Ahnentafel  Attila’s  nach  Johannes  von  Thurocz,  in  Bulletin  of 
the  Imperial  Academy  of  St.  Petersburg,  5th  series,  vol.  xiii,  no.  2. 
(September,  1900.) 


186 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


do  not  know  what  sources  this  author  had  before  him ; and 
it  was  generally  believed  that  he  had  drawn  upon  his 
imagination  for  his  facts.  This  was  my  own  belief,  too, 
until  I compared  the  names  found  in  the  Latin  chronicle 
with  those  appearing  in  a genealogical  table  of  Hiung-nu 
kings,  reconstructed  from  Chinese  records.  I then  found 
that  some  of  the  names  of  the  chronicle  in  their  proper 
generations  and  the  identical  sequence  are  strongly  sug- 
gestive of  the  Chinese  transcriptions  of  the  names  of  certain 
Hiung-nu  kings  then  settled  in  the  north  of  China.  The 
Hungarian  carries  his  list  to  the  thirtieth  ancestor  of  King 
Attila.  At  the  head  of  it  he  places,  in  accordance  with  the 
time-honored  custom  of  medieval  authors,  certain  Biblical 
names.  If  we  except  these,  from  Noah  down  to  Nimrod,  the 
first  name  having  an  indigenous  coloring  is  that  of  King 
Attila’s  thirty-third  ancestor  which,  if  we  give  an  average 
of  thirty-three  years  to  each  generation,  carries  us  to  about 
the  year  635  b.c.  If  we  can  make  up  our  minds  as  to  the 
chronicler’s  bona  fides  with  regard  to  King  Attila’s  ancestors 
during  the  Han  period,  we  may  perhaps  be  justified  in 
doing  so  as  regards  the  Chou  dynasty  to  the  extent  of 
assuming  that  at  least  that  portion  of  the  northern  tribes 
which  was  looked  upon  as  the  ancestral  horde  of  the  later 
Hiung-nu  was  governed  by  kings  of  the  same  family. 
Ssi-ma  Ts’ien  {Shl-ki,  ch.  cx,  p.  9)  even  goes  a good  deal 
farther,  when  he  asserts  that  “from  Shun-wei  [their  alleged 
first  monarch,  called  a descendant  of  the  Chinese  Emperor 
Yii]  down  to  T’ou-man  [probably  standing  for  Turkish 
Tuman,  or  Tumdn,  ‘ten  thousand,’  Mau-tun’s  father,  who 
died  209  b.c.]  fully  a thousand  years  elapsed,  though  their 
genealogy  could  not  be  traced.”  This  would  bring  us  to 
the  thirteenth  century  b.c.,  as  the  period  in  which  regal 


GRADUAL  DECLINE  OF  CENTRAL  POWER  187 


power  was  organized  at  least  among  some  portion  of  the 
Huns. 

The  name  Jung,  foimd  in  the  Tso-chuan,  is  probably 
nothing  but  another  form  of  the  root  Hun  or  Kun,  which, 
we  have  seen,  has  assumed  the  most  different  shapes  in  the 
comse  of  Chinese  history.  For  like  the  Hun-yii,  Hien- 
yiin,  etc.,  they  may  be  located,  from  the  indications  of  the 
Tso-chuan,  in  certain  parts  of  the  northern  or  western 
boundary.  This  boundary  was  then,  however,  much  nearer 
the  center  of  the  empire  than  it  was  later  on.  One  of  the 
tribes  called  Jung  for  generations  made  constant  inroads 
on  the  state  of  Lu  in  the  present  Shan-tung,  and  is  said  to 
have  had  its  seat  at  one  time  in  the  present  prefecture  of 
Ts’au-chou,  south  of  the  Yellow  River.  The  Pei-jung,  or 
“Northern  Jung,”  the  Shan-jung,  or  “Hill  Jung,”  which 
name  seems  to  indicate  that  they  were  not  occupants  of 
the  steppe,  and  the  Wu-chung  were  settled  in  Tsun-hua- 
ch6u  about  one  hundred  miles  east  of  Peking.  According 
to  the  Tso-chuan,  the  Northern  Jung  made  a raid  on  the 
state  of  Chong  in  the  north  of  K’ai-fong-fu,  Ho-nan.  This 
entry  in  the  Tso-chuan  ^ is  of  importance,  inasmuch  as  it 
states  that,  while  the  Chinese  were  fighting  in  chariots,  the 
Jung  had  only  foot-soldiers.  The  Tso-chuan  says : — 

“The  Earl  of  Chung  withstood  them,  but  was  troubled  by  the 
nature  of  their  troops,  and  said,  ‘They  are  footmen,  while  we 
have  chariots.  The  fear  is,  lest  they  fall  suddenly  upon  us.’ 
His  son  Tu  said : ‘ Let  a body  of  bold  men,  but  not  persistent, 
feign  an  attack  upon  the  thieves,  and  then  quickly  draw  off  from 
them ; and  at  the  same  time  place  three  bodies  in  ambuscade  to 
be  ready  for  them.  The  Jung  are  light  and  nimble,  but  have  no 
order ; they  are  greedy  and  have  no  love  for  one  another ; when 
they  conquer,  no  one  will  yield  place  to  his  fellow ; and  when  they 

‘ Legge,  p.  28. 


188 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


are  defeated,  no  one  tries  to  save  another.  When  their  front  men 
see  their  success,  they  will  think  of  nothing  but  to  push  forward. 
When  they  are  thus  advancing  and  fall  into  the  ambush,  they 
will  be  sure  to  hurry  away  in  flight.  Those  behind  will  not  go 
to  their  rescue,  so  there  will  be  no  support  to  them ; and  thus 
your  anxiety  may  be  relieved.'  The  earl  followed  this  plan.  As 
soon  as  the  front  men  of  the  Jung  met  those  who  were  in  am- 
buscade, they  fled,  pursued  by  Chu  Tan.  Their  detachment  was 
surrounded  and  smitten  both  in  front  and  in  rear  till  they  were 
all  cut  to  pieces.  The  rest  of  the  Jung  made  a grand  flight.” 

This  description  of  the  battle,  recorded  under  the  year 
714  B.C.,  shows  that  the  Northern  Jung,  then  said  to  be 
settled  in  Yung-p’ing-fu,  Chi-li,  were  fighting  without 
horses  and  that  this  was  regarded  as  a disadvantage  to  the 
Chinese,  who  fought  in  chariots.  We  are  further  told  by 
the  Tso-chuan^  that  the  Jung  and  the  Ti  were  continually 
changing  their  residence,  and  were  fond  of  exchanging  land 
for  goods.  This  latter  weakness,  if  we  may  so  call  it,  was 
probably  the  reason  for  the  Chinese  buying  the  barbarians 
off  their  territory,  when  an  appeal  to  arms  failed,  and  of 
finally  driving  them  into  the  Mongolian  steppe,  their  later 
home.  This  is  also  probably  one  of  the  reasons  why  the 
federal  states  occupying  the  boundaries  facing  uncivilized 
barbarians,  have  grown  so  powerful  as  compared  with  the 
emperor’s  own  dominions,  which  lay  in  the  middle  of  the 
empire  and  occupied  a comparatively  small  territory  north 
and  south  of  the  Yellow  River  about  the  present  city  of 
Ho-nan-fu.  The  states  of  Tsin  and  Ts’in  had  apparently 
the  lion’s  share  in  territorial  extension  at  the  expense  of 
their  Hunnish  neighbors.  The  state  of  Yen,  occupying  the 
present  Chi-li,  was  similarly  successful;  other  states  like 
Ts’i,  Lu,  Wei,  Chu,  Sung,  Ku,  etc.,  were  hemmed  in  by  the 

* Legge,  p.  424. 


GRADUAL  DECLINE  OF  CENTRAL  POWER  189 


sea-coast  and  could  not,  of  course,  increase  by  conquest 
among  the  barbarians.  This,  however,  was  the  case  in  a 
prominent  degree  with  the  third  of  the  great  feudal  states, 
Ch’u  (to  be  distinguished  from  Chu  mentioned  above). 

The  state  of  Ch’u  was  chiefly  occupied  by  the  southern 
barbarians  known  as  Man,  or  Man-tzl,  Marco  Polo’s  Manzi. 
Ch'u  w'as  its  name  as  a state,  which,  like  Tsin  and  Ts’in 
and  all  the  other  territories  surrounding  the  imperial  do- 
main, was  under  the  more  or  less  nominal  jurisdiction  of 
the  Son  of  Heaven.  In  those  very  scanty  records  preserved 
of  the  reign  of  Chau-wang,  the  region  where  this  worthless 
monarch  came  to  gi’ief,  while  crossing  a river  in  1002  b.c., 
is  described  as  "the  south.”  Ssi-ma  Ts’ien  simply  says 
that  Chau  went  to  "the  south”  on  a tour  of  inspection, 
and  that  he  did  not  return,  having  died  on  the  kiang,  or 
river.'  Later  commentators,  how^ever,  identify  " the  south  ” 
with  the  Ch’u  country;  and,  since  this  entire  region  was 
even  at  a much  later  period  occupied  by  the  Man  barbarians, 
we  may  look  upon  this  as  an  early  mention  of  their  country. 
In  the  Tso-chuan  commentary  on  the  " Spring  and  Autumn 
Annals,”  the  Ch’u  state  is  constantly  referred  to  under  this 
name ; but  in  the  main  text  it  was  called  King  down  to  the 
year  659  b.c.,  when  the  name  Ch’u  took  its  place.  From 
the  tradition  preserved  in  the  commentaries^  it  would 
appear  that  the  semi-barbarous  state,  if  we  may  so  call  it, 
was  from  remote  antiquity  governed  by  rulers  of  Chinese 
extraction.  The  chiefs  of  Ch’u  were  at  first  viscounts  with 
the  surname  Mi,  which  means  "the  bleating  of  sheep.” 
Their  lineage  is  traced  up  to  prehistoric  times,  the  family 
being  said  to  be  descended  from  the  Emperor  Chuan-hii 

* Chavannes,  Mimoires  historiques,  vol.  i,  p.  250.  * Legge,  Coun- 
ts’iu,  p.  86. 


190 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


(2510-2433  B.c.)-  This  sounds,  of  course,  very  fabulous; 
but  representatives  of  the  line  are  mentioned  by  name  as 
early  as  the  times  of  Won-wang  and  Wu-wang,  i.e.  in  the 
twelfth  century  b.c.,  when  the  head  of  the  family  was  named 
Yii-hiung.  His  great-grandson,  Hiung  I,  was  invested  by 
Ch’ong-wang,  the  second  Chou  emperor,  with  the  lands  of 
King-man,  i.e.  “ the  Man  barbarians  of  King.”  His  capital 
was  Tan-yang  in  the  neighborhood  of  the  present  city  of 
Ichang,  in  Hu-pei.  It  appears  that  after  him  the  family 
name  of  the  Man  rulers  was  Hiung,  “Bear,”  and  from 
them  this  Chinese  family  name  is  supposed  to  have  been 
derived. ‘ In  887  b.c.  one  Hiung  K’ii  usurped  the  title 
of  king,  which  was  afterward  dropped  for  a time,  but 
permanently  resumed  by  Hiung  T’ung,  known  as  King  Wu, 
in  704  B.C.,  who  also  moved  his  capital  to  Ying,  near  the 
present  city  of  King-chou-fu.*  The  rule  of  the  Hiung 
family  extends  from  1078  b.c.  down  to  the  extinction  of 
the  Ch’u  state  by  that  of  Ts’in  in  223  b.c.  Whether  the 
forty  names  mentioned  in  this  list  are  those  of  descendants 
of  an  originally  Chinese  family,  as  their  being  traced  to  the 
mythical  emperor  Chuan-hii  would  indicate,  or  whether 
they  were  the  descendants  of  an  aboriginal  Man  family, 
is  immaterial.  This  seems  a matter  of  doubt.  On  the  one 
hand,  their  pedigree  being  traced  to  the  Emperor  Chuan-hii 
may  not  have  more  historical  value  than  King  Attila’s 
in  John  of  Thurocz’s  “ Chronica  Himgaromm,”  headed, 
as  that  is,  by  the  Biblical  names  Noah,  Japheth,  Cush,  and 

* See  Giles,  The  Family  Names,  in  Journ.  of  the  China  Branch 
of  the  Royal  Asiatic  Society,  New  Series,  vol.  xxi,  1886,  p.  265,  no.  121. 

’ For  a genealogical  table  of  the  rulers  over  the  state  of  Ch’u,  see 
Appendix;  Chronological  Tables,  xi;  also  Legge,  Ch’ un-ts’ iu,  Prole- 
gomena, p.  109  seq.;  and  Shl-ki,  ch.  xiv,  Chavannes,  vol.  iii,  p. 
35  seq. 


GRADUAL  DECLINE  OF  CENTRAL  POWER  191 


Nimrod.  The  Hungarian  chronicler  here  merely  indulges 
in  what  may  be  called  the  European  practice  of  his  age. 
The  Chinese  did  something  similar  in  extending  the  pedi- 
grees of  distinguished  barbarian  houses  to  some  of  their 
old  legendary  emperors.  We  find  a perfect  parallel  in  the 
great  khans  of  the  Hiung-nu,  whom  the  Chinese  described 
as  descendants  of  their  Emperor  Yii,  and  we  can  prove 
from  Chinese  history  that,  within  historical  times,  princes 
of  the  same  family  were  proud  to  refer  to  their  Chinese 
pedigree.  The  rulers  of  the  state  of  Ch’u  certainly  identi- 
fied themselves  with  their  people,  at  least  in  certain  pas- 
sages of  Ssi-ma  Ts’ien’s  Shi-ki,'^  where  Hiung  K’ii,  ruler  of 
Ch’u  some  time  in  the  ninth  century  b.c.,  justifies  the 
appointment  of  his  sons  as  “lungs”  of  certain  Man  bar- 
barians in  the  Yang-tzi  region,  saying,  “We  are  Man 
barbarians  and  have  nothing  to  do  with  Chinese  titles,” 
which  refer  to  the  year  704  b.c.,  when  Hiung  T’ung,  dis- 
satisfied with  the  scant  recognition  he  had  hitherto  received 
at  the  hands  of  the  imperial  court,  assumed  on  his  own 
responsibility  the  title  of  “king,”  as  under  the  existing 
circumstances  he  seemed  justified  in  doing.  In  a discus- 
sion with  his  opponent,  the  Prince  of  Sui,  he  distinctly  says, 
“We  are  Man  barbarians”  {Wo  Man-i  ye).  Chavannes^ 
translates  these  words  even  by  “ Je  suis  un  barbare  ” ; but 
it  appears  that  both  interpretations  may  be  justified. 
Anyhow,  he  may  have  called  himself  a barbarian  in  spite 
of  Chinese  descent.  He  goes  on  to  say  that  “now  the 
princes  of  the  empire  are  in  a state  of  rebellion,  that  they 
encroach  on  their  territories  and  that  some  even  kill  each 
other.”  On  expressing  his  desire  that  the  emperor  should 
give  him  a higher  title,  the  court  refused  this  request,  upon 
* Ch.  xl,  pp.  3 B and  5 A.  * Vol.  iv,  p.  344. 


192 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


which  the  barbarian  chief  recapitulates  the  history  of  his 
house,  saying,  “My  forefather  Yii  Hiung  was  instructor  to 
Won-wang.  Ch’ong-wang  gave  my  forefathers  a baronetcy 
and  instructed  them  to  live  in  Ch’u,  and  the  Man  barbarians 
all  recognized  him  as  their  leader,”  etcd  This  again  may 
involve  that  the  Ch’u  princes  were  originally  a Chinese 
family,  and  that  we  may  place  confidence  in  the  detailed 
pedigree  communicated  in  Ssi-ma  Ts’ien’s  chapter  devoted 
to  the  Ch’u  kingdom,^  which  contains  no  allusion  to  the 
Man  barbarians  down  to  the  time  of  Ch’5ng-wang.  The 
non-barbarian  origin  of  this  pedigree  is,  moreover,  if  lineage 
and  names  as  given  by  Ssi-ma  Ts’ien  are  correct,  greatly 
supported  by  the  fact  of  Yii  Hiung,  Won-wang’s  teacher, 
having  been  one  of  the  most  distinguished  writers  of  the 
Chinese  language  during  his  time,  he  being  known  as  the 
author  of  a book,  the  Yu-tzi,  the  “ Philosopher  Yii,”  which 
is  possibly  the  oldest  specimen  of  Chinese  literature ; older 
even  than  the  I-king,  though  opinions  are  divided  on  that 
point.®  In  forming  an  opinion  as  to  the  cultural  develop- 
ment of  the  barbarians,  we  should  take  the  following  facts 
into  consideration:  — 

The  Man  barbarians  were  organized  into  a state,  ruled 
over  by  a continuous  line  of  princes,  and,  as  such,  formed 
an  integral  part  of  the  Chinese  empire  under  the  Chou 
dynasty.  Their  state  territory  extended  from  about  23 
degrees  north  latitude  in  the  north  to  Lake  Tung-t’ing  and 
beyond  in  the  south.  An  expansion  from  north  to  south 
probably  took  place  during  this  long  period  of  political 
life,  since  we  find  Man  barbarians  occupying  the  whole 
south  and  southwest  of  China  and  the  adjacent  parts  in 

‘ Chavannes,  loc.  cit.  ^ Chavannes,  p.  337  seqq.  ® Wylie,  Notes  on 
Chinese  Literature,  p.  125. 


GRADUAL  DECLINE  OF  CENTRAL  POWER  193 


Tung-king.  For,  soon  after  the  absorption  of  the  state  of 
Ch’u  by  Ts’in,  the  native  state  of  Ts’in-shi-huang-ti  (em- 
peror of  China  in  221  b.c.),  we  find  a native  of  north  China, 
Chau  T’o,  appointed  king  of  the  Man  barbarians.  Accord- 
ing to  Chinese  views,  the  south  of  China  in  the  present  coast 
provinces  and  on  the  Tung-king  border  was  an  uninhabited 
wilderness  at  the  dawn  of  history,  and  the  inhabitants 
found  there  later  on  were  immigrants  from  north  and 
central  China.  The  word  M an,  as  an  ethnic  term,  is  liable 
to  create  confusion,  and  requires  some  specification  to  be 
rightly  imderstood.  The  term  Nan-man,  “southern  Man,” 
or  “barbarians,”  in  its  widest  sense  comprises  nations  of 
quite  different  affinities  from  those  of  the  Man  barbarians 
who  formed  the  state  of  Ch’u  under  the  Chou  dynasty; 
but  from  the  genealogy  of  the  southern  and  southwestern 
tribes,  as  reconstructed  from  Chinese  sources,  it  appears 
that  the  Man  of  that  southern  state  of  the  Chou  empire 
retreated  before  the  extension  of  Chinese  culture  into  their 
later  southern  territories,  which  extended  far  beyond  the 
present  limits  of  China  deep  into  the  Malay  Peninsula. 
It  is,  of  course,  quite  possible,  that  races  of  the  Man  type 
have  been  settled  there  from  times  immemorial  and  that  the 
Chinese  idea  of  their  having  immigrated  there  from  the 
north  originated  in  the  fact  that  they  were  discovered 
within  historical  periods  in  parts  of  the  continent  formerly 
believed  to  be  uninhabited.  Yet  the  wandering  spirit  of 
some  of  their  tribes  can  be  clearly  traced  in  Chinese  history. 
The  best  proof  for  this  is  what  we  read,  for  instance,  about  the 
history  of  one  of  their  great  divisions,  the  Liau  barbarians, 
whose  original  seats  were  in  Han-chung,  south  of  the  pres- 
ent Si-an-fu,  whence  they  spread  over  the  province  of  Ssi- 
ch’uan  and  farther  on  to  Kui-chou.  In  the  twelfth  century 


194 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


A.D.,  if  not  earlier,  we  find  them  divided  into  over  a hundred 
tribes  on  the  southwest  of  the  river  Yu-kiang  near  the 
boundary  of  Tung-kingd  According  to  an  old  legend,  a 
Man  barbarian  named  P’an-hu  assisted  the  emperor  Ti-k’u 
(2432  B.c.)  in  procuring  the  head  of  his  enemy,  a certain 
chief  of  the  K’iian-jung,  for  which  he  gave  him,  among  other 
rewards,  his  daughter  in  marriage.  This  P’an-hu  became 
the  legendary  ancestor  of  quite  a number  of  southern  bar- 
barian tribes,  the  Miau-tzi  being  among  them  according 
to  some  accounts.  There  is,  of  course,  not  the  slightest 
historical  foundation  for  this  popular  story;  but  the  legend 
seems  to  point  to  an  early  relationship  between  the  Man 
barbarians  and  the  Chinese  race,  to  whom  they  rendered 
assistance  in  fighting  their  other  neighbors,  the  Huns.^ 
AVliether  we  assume  the  tribes  now  found  in  the  northern 
part  of  the  Malay  Peninsula  to  have  migrated  there  from 
the  confines  of  China,  or  whether  they  have  been  settled 
there  from  times  immemorial,  so  much  is  certain,  that 
wanderings  from  north  to  south  have  taken  place  on  Chinese 
territory;  that  the  forefathers  of  at  least  some  of  them 
during  the  Chou  dynasty  were  subjects  of  the  state  of  Ch’u; 
that  they  must  consequently  have  participated  to  a certain 
extent  in  the  benefits  of  Chinese  civilization,  and  that 
those  who  were  formerly  connected  with  the  Ch’u  state 
may  have  become  the  mediators  of  such  traces  of  Chinese 
influence  which  may  now  be  discovered  not  only  among 
the  former  members  of  the  Ch’u  state  as  one  of  the  con- 
federate territories  of  China  under  the  Chou  dynasty,  but 
also  among  their  southern  neighbors  on  the  Malay  Penin- 

* Cf . D’  Hervey  de  Saint-Denys,  Ethnographic  des  peuples  Grangers 
d la  Chine,  vol.  ii,  pp.  106-121.  * Cf.  D’ Hervey  de  Saint-Denys,  op. 
cit.,  pp.  1-45. 


GRADUAL  DECLINE  OF  CENTRAL  POWER  195 


sula.  Such  Chinese  influences  may  have  existed  in  former 
ages  without  their  being  traceable  in  the  records. 

The  only  legacy  left  to  us  of  the  old  Man  culture  consists 
of  a still  limited  number  of  ancient  bronze  drums  bearing 
ornaments  on  their  outer  surface,  some  of  which  may  be 
declared  as  being  of  Chinese  origin,  whereas  other  specimens, 
and  probably  the  oldest  ones  among  them,  whatever  their 
age  may  be,  have  been  for  years  a problem  still  awaiting 
solution.  To  judge  from  the  localities  where  such  bronze 
drums  were  first  discovered,  whether  in  the  tombs  of  old 
Man  chiefs  or  among  dealers  in  antiquities  in  China,  or  in 
some  place  on  the  Malay  Peninsula,  and  from  what  the 
Chinese  have  placed  on  record  regarding  them,  I feel  in- 
clined to  comprise  all  the  aboriginal  tribes  who  can  be 
shown  to  have  made  use  of  the  bronze  drum  as  an  instru- 
ment of  authority  or  worship  under  the  common  name  of 
'' bronze  drum  nations.”  The  area  on  which  these  imple- 
ments can  be  shown  either  to  have  been  used  formerly  or 
to  be  used  at  the  present  day  may  be  said  to  extend  from 
the  Yang-tzi  region  in  the  north  over  the  whole  southwest 
of  China,  including  portions  of  the  Kuang-tung  province, 
and  well  into  the  Malay  Peninsula  and  even  some  islands 
of  the  Archipelago.  The  nations  which  might  come  within 
this  denomination  of  “bronze  drum  nations”  may  be 
divided  into  a northern  and  a southern  section.  The  former, 
comprising  the  several  denominations  of  the  Man  bar- 
barians and  the  Miau-tzi  and  extending  certainly  as  far 
south  as  the  present  boundary  of  China,  offer  scarcely  any 
difficulty  as  to  their  most  ancient  connection  with  Chinese 
civilization  through  the  Ch’u  state.  Several  of  the  south- 
Chinese  Man  barbarians  can  be  shown  to  have  migrated 
to  their  later  homes  from  the  old  Ch’u  territory  within  his- 


196 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


torical  periods,  and  the  Miau-tzi,  as  well  as  other  aboriginal 
tribes,  probably  including  the  Tangutans  in  the  northwest 
of  China,  are  referred  by  the  old  legend  of  the  banishment 
of  the  San-iniau‘  to  former  seats  in  central  China  in  remote 
antiquity.  The  southern  section,  comprising  various  tribes 
of  the  Malay  Peninsula,  cannot,  as  far  as  I am  aware,  be 
traced  to  the  ancient  Ch’u  state,  and  if  in  their  case  migra- 
tions from  north  to  south  have  at  all  taken  place,  they 
must  be  referred  to  prehistoric  periods. 

It  seems  difficult  to  decide  whether  any  racial  affinities 
exist  between  the  several  nations  using  bronze  drums.  It 
appears,  however,  that  traces  of  Chinese  influences  appear 
in  the  ornament  even  of  the  more  remote  discoveries,  since 
one  of  its  principal  elements  is  the  more  or  less  convention- 
alized figure  of  a bird,  standing  or  flying,  which  can  only  be 
identified  with  the  south-China  egret,  an  old  traditional 
emblem  of  the  Chinese  skin  drum.  The  southern  section 
may  also  have  been  influenced  in  its  culture  from  India, 
and  finally  the  Man  and  other  barbarians  may  have  added 
features  of  their  own  invention  to  the  traditional  ornament 
of  Chinese  or  Indian  origin.  Tliis  probably  holds  good 
with  regard  to  the  figures  of  frogs  or  toads  cast  on  the  face 
of  these  instruments  corresponding  to  the  skin  of  ordinary 
drums.  These  frogs,  found  on  some  of  the  most  ancient 
specimens  discovered  in  south  China,  may  be  interpreted 
as  a totem  of  the  barbarians  of  Kuang-tung,  Kuang-si,  etc., 
since  the  barbarian  inhabitants  of  the  old  state  of  Nan- 
yue  are  referred  to  by  the  name  of  “frogs”  or  “toads”  in 
an  entry  in  the  Chinese  court  annals  under  the  year  112  b.c.^ 

* See  above,  p.  85.  ^ Cf.  Hirth,  Chinesische  Ansichten  iiber  Bron- 

zetrommeln.  Leipzig  (Otto  Harrassowitz),  1904,  and  the  several 
works  and  papers  referred  to  therein  by  Meyer  and  Foy,  Heger,  De 
Groot,  etc. 


GRADUAL  DECLINE  OF  CENTRAL  POWER  197 


Surrounded  by  its  federal  states  was  the  emperor’s  own 
domain  of  Chou,  a comparatively  small  territory  in  the 
present  province  of  Ho-nan.  The  imperial  power  during 
the  Ch’un-ts’iu  period  had  become  more  and  more  nominal, 
and  the  Ch’un-ts’iu  itself,  as  explained  above,  does  not 
describe  the  history  of  the  Chou  emperors,  but  that  of  the 
princes  of  Lu.  The  history  of  the  other  states,  though 
much  more  important  from  a political  point  of  view,  has 
to  be  reconstructed  from  the  liberal  amplifications  con- 
tained in  the  Tso-chuan.  The  line  of  Lu  rulers  is  represented 
by  twenty-eight  names,  extending  from  1122  b.c.  to  249 
B.c.  The  Ch’un-ts’iu  records  of  Lu  history  begin  with  the 
fifteenth  ruler  of  that  state,  Duke  Yin,  in  722  b.c.  The 
main  text  of  the  Ch’un-ts’iu  narrates  the  events  of  history 
from  the  local  Lu  point  of  view  year  by  year  under  the 
twelve  following  dukes  down  to  the  fourteenth  year  of 
Duke  Ai,  about  480  b.c.,  and  the  commentaries  carry  it 
just  about  a generation  farther  on.  With  the  understand- 
ing that,  as  a matter  of  course,  each  of  the  federal  states 
has  had  its  own  history,  claiming  at  some  time  or  other 
much  greater  importance  than  that  of  the  imperial  house 
itself,  I propose  to  continue  my  account  where  I left  it,  at 
the  death  of  P’ing-wang  with  the  most  noteworthy  events 
during  the  time  of  his  successors  as  Chou  emperors. 

§ 40.  Huan-wang  (719-697  b.c.) 

Huan-wang,  P’ing-wang’s  grandson,  tried  in  vain  to 
assert  his  authority  among  the  contending  states.  His 
reign  was  characterized  by  constant  wars  among  his  vas- 
sals, and  his  attempts  to  establish  order  ended  in  defeat 
on  several  occasions.  Huan-wang  died  in  the  twenty- 
third  year  of  his  reign  and  was  followed  by  his  eldest  son, 
Chuang-wang. 


VI 

THE  CENTURY  OF  THE  “FIVE  LEADERS” 
(685-591  B.c.) 


VI 


THE  CENTURY  OF  THE  “FIVE  LEADERS”  (685-591  b.c.) 

§ 41.  Chuang-wang  (696-682  b.c.) 

There  was  some  trouble  in  the  succession  to  the 
throne,  the  emperor  having  declared  himself  in  favor 
of  his  second  son.  But  to  the  exertions  of  the  minister 
Sin-po  it  was  due  that  the  legitimate  succession  gained  the 
upper  hand.  Court  intrigue  had  ended  in  an  attempt  to 
take  the  emperor’s  life  in  694  b.c.,  and  had  been  success- 
fully defeated  by  Sin-po.  The  rival  prince  fled  to  a northern 
state,  and  his  chief  patron,  Hei-kien,  Duke  of  Chou,  was  be- 
headed. During  the  preceding  year  (October  3,  694  n.c.), 
an  eclipse  of  the  sun  is  recorded  in  the  main  text  of  the 
Ch’un-ts’iu. 

Under  the  reign  of  Chuang-wang  we  have  to  record  the 
temporary  rise  to  considerable  power  of  one  of  the  minor 
federal  states,  that  of  Ts’i,  occupying  the  northeast,  with 
a portion  of  the  sea-coast,  of  the  present  province  of  Shan- 
tung and  adjoining  the  right  bank  of  the  lower  course  of 
the  Yellow  River.  The  political  success  of  this  state  dates 
from  the  prudent  administration  of  Duke  Huan,  who,  as  its 
fifteenth  ruler,  reigned  from  685  to  643  b.c.  Duke  Huan’s 
good  fortunes  were  entirely  due  to  the  excellent  advice  he 
received  from  his  prime  minister,  the  philosopher  Kuan- 
tzi,  known  also  as  Kuan  Chung  and  Kuan  I-wu.  Kuan-tzi 
impresses  us  as  having  furnished  an  example,  unparalleled 

201 


202 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


in  the  history  of  nations,  of  scientific  reasoning  applied  to 
practical  statesmanship.  The  chief  aim  of  his  policy  was 
the  economic  development  of  the  nation,  and  by  applying 
his  theories  to  state  life,  he  did  more  for  the  benefit  of  his 
country  than  many  of  the  official  advisers  of  the  emperors 
and  princes  both  before  and  after  him.  For  a careful  digest 
of  his  life  and  doctrines  the  reader  is  referred  to  G.  von 
der  Gabelentz’s  excellent  monograph  “ Vorbereitendes  zur 
Kritik  des  Kuan-tsi.”  ‘ His  theories  have  been  recorded 
in  a book  handed  down  under  the  title  of  Kuan-tzi,  the 
“Philosopher  Kuan,”  which  is  printed  both  as  a separate 
work  and  as  one  of  a series  comprising  the  ten  minor  philos- 
ophers of  antiquity.  Opinions  are  divided  as  to  its  author- 
ship, some  authorities,  both  native  and  foreign,  holding 
that  it  was  compiled  during  the  Han  dynasty.  Giles* 
calls  it  “one  of  the  numerous  forgeries  of  later  times”; 
but  I feel  inclined  to  side  with  Grube,  who  ® regards  the 
subject-matter  of  this  text  as  contemporaneous.  Indeed, 
if  we  compare  Kuan-tzi’s  wisdom  in  governing  with  what 
we  read  in  the  Chdu-li  concerning  Chinese  government 
institutions  during  the  Chou  dynasty,  there  would  seem  to 
be  no  reason  to  doubt  that  the  almost  modern  method  of 
deriving  political  action  from  philosophical  reasoning  need 
not  be  looked  upon  as  an  anachronism  in  the  face  of  the 
deep  interest  with  which  the  intelligent  part  of  the  nation 
has  devoted  itself  to  the  advancement  of  official  life  ever 
since  the  early  Chou  rulers.  The  advice  given  to  his  duke 
by  Kuan-tzi  has  become  the  prototype  of  governmental 
prudence  for  Chinese  official  life.  Thus  Kuan-tzi,  by  meas- 

* Sitzgb.  d.  Kgl.  Preuss.  Akad.  d.  Wissensch.,  1892,  vol.  i,  p.  127  seqq. 
* A Chinese  Biographical  Dictionary,  p.  382.  ’ Geschichte  der  chines- 
ischen  LUteratur,  p.  113. 


THE  CENTURY  OF  THE  “FIVE  LEADERS”  203 


ures  he  adopted  in  the  federal  state  of  Ts’i,  has  become  the 
father  of  institutions  of  the  utmost  importance  to  the 
whole  empire  during  its  later  economic  development ; for 
example,  in  regard  to  the  iron  and  salt  monopolies.  If  we 
consider  that  his  lifetime  lay  in  the  early  days  of  regal 
Rome,  and  that  the  work  of  his  life  was  done  before  Solon 
the  Athenian  was  born,  Kuan-tzi  may  be  regarded  as 
having  furnished  the  very  type  of  a statesman  in  the 
modern  sense  by  collecting  facts  for  the  purposes  of  gov- 
ernmental administration ; further,  by  endeavoring  to 
describe  such  facts  in  the  shape  of  a numerical  formula, 
he  may  in  the  proper  sense  of  the  word  be  regarded  as 
the  oldest  “statistician”  of  all  nations.  The  method 
he  adopted  in  persuading  his  monarch  to  introduce 
taxes  on  salt  and  on  iron  may  in  all  respects  be  called 
statistical. 

The  duke  in  a conversation  with  Kuan-tzi  had  consulted 
him  on  government  affairs,  and  was  advised  to  levy  taxes 
upon  salt  and  iron,  hitherto  not  sources  of  public  revenue. 
“How  is  this  to  be  done?”  the  duke  inquired;  upon  which 
the  philosopher  replied:  “In  a family  of  ten  individuals 
there  will  be  ten  consumers  of  salt ; in  a family  of  a hundred 
there  will  be  a hundred  consumers.  A male  adult  will 
consume  five  pints  or  at  least  half  that  quantity  of  salt 
every  month ; a female  adult,  three  pints,  or  at  least  half  of 
this ; a child,  two  pints,  or  at  least  half  of  this.  These  are 
the  averages  for  salt  consumption.”  Kuan-tzi  continues 
his  reasoning  by  calculating  from  these  averages  the  con- 
sumption, not  known  at  his  time,  for  the  whole  country. 
“In  a country  of  ten  thousand  chariots,”  he  says,  “the 
munber  of  consuming  individuals  may  be  set  down  at  ten 
millions.”  Upon  these  salt  consumers  the  philosopher 


204 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


recommends  the  imposition  of  a tax  payable  by  the  dealers 
in  this  article;  this,  he  said,  would  be  an  impost  which 
nobody  could  escape. 

With  a similar  calculation  he  recommended  the  intro- 
duction of  a tax  upon  the  iron  production  of  the  country. 
The  officials  in  charge  of  the  iron-works  had  reported  that 
every  woman  in  the  country  must  have  a needle  and  a 
knife ; that  every  field  laborer  must  have  a plough,  a spade, 
and  a cooking-pan,  a cart,  a hatchet,  etc.,  — all  these 
being  necessaries  of  life,  a tax  upon  which  would  be  a regular 
source  of  public  revenue.  This  conversation  of  Kuan-tzi 
with  his  duke  led  to  the  institution  of  the  salt  and  the  iron 
monopolies,  both  of  which  not  only  yielded  the  desired 
revenue,  but  also  became  a great  stimulus  to  succeeding 
governments  to  do  all  in  their  power  to  promote  produc- 
tion as  well  as  consumption.  We  know  that  the  iron  in- 
dustry of  China  assumed  important  dimensions  during 
the  following  centuries.  Chinese  iron  must  have  been  of 
very  superior  quality,  since  not  only  the  countries  of 
central  Asia  drew  their  supplies  from  the  Far  East,  but 
even  the  Roman  market,  as  is  known  from  Pliny,  who  says, 
that  of  all  kinds  of  iron  coming  to  Rome  the  Chinese  (sm- 
cum  ferrum)  is  the  best.  The  salt  produced  on  the  Shan- 
tung coast  during  the  Chou  dynasty  was  not  only  con- 
sumed in  the  country  of  Ts’i,  but  we  are  informed  that  the 
states  of  Liang,  Chou,  Sung,  Wei,  and  Tu-yang  were  in 
great  trouble  when  the  usual  supply  was  not  forthcoming 
from  Ts’i,  not  to  speak  of  the  frontier  nations,  the  Huns, 
etc.,  who  were  then  entirely  dependent  on  this  source.  The 
salt  monopoly  introduced  by  Kuan-tzi  thus  became  the 
source  of  immense  wealth,  collected  in  the  state  of  Ts’i, 
and  was  the  basis  of  a regular  system  of  administra- 


THE  CENTURY  OF  THE  “FIVE  LEADERS” 


205 


tion  known  hereafter  as  yen-fa,  i.e.  ‘'the  method  of  salt  ad- 
ministration.” There  are  apparently  no  records  to  show 
that  a similar  system  existed  in  other  parts  of  the  coast 
during  the  Chou  dynasty;  but  the  native  account  from 
which  I have  derived  my  information  states  that  the  state 
revenue  yielded  by  the  salt  and  iron  monopolies  had  dur- 
ing the  Ts’in  dynasty  (255-209  n.c.)  grown  to  about  twenty 
times  the  amount  gained  during  the  Chou  period.^ 

These  are  merely  some  important  examples  of  govern- 
mental reforms  introduced  by  Kuan-tzi.  It  goes  without 
saying  that  the  economic  development  of  the  little  state 
could  in  the  hands  of  a clever  administrator  be  changed 
into  an  instrument  by  which  political  power  might  be 
wielded  over  rival  states,  which  had  for  generations  be- 
come dependent  for  their  supplies  upon  industrious  Ts’i. 
The  discussions  on  political  and  economic  subjects  laid 
down  in  Kuan-tzi’s  work  extend  to  all  possible  questions  of 
government;  and  even  if  we  grant  that  much  of  the  ex- 
isting text  may  be  interpolations,  it  is  not  likely  that  the 
doctrines  attributed  to  Kuan-tzi  sprang  entirely  from  the 
imagination  of  Han  compilers.  As  Grube  points  out,  Ssi-ma 
Ts’ien  states  that  the  philosopher’s  descendants  held  high 
offices  as  hereditary  fief-holders  for  more  than  ten  genera- 
tions in  succession,  and  that  this  may  furnish  an  explana- 
tion why  Kuan-tzi’s  memory,  in  the  shape  of  the  work 
bearing  his  name,  was  preserved  with  such  piety  among 
his  family  records. 

The  great  success,  due  to  a large  extent  to  Kuan-tzi’s 
advice,  of  the  state  of  Ts’i  initiated  a period  lasting  about 

* Cf.  my  Notes  on  the  Early  History  of  the  Salt  Monopoly  in 
China,  in  Journal  of  the  China  Branch  of  the  Royal  Asiatic  Society, 
New  Series,  vol.  xxii,  p.  55  seqq. 


206 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


a century,  during  which  some  of  the  great  feudal  states 
began  to  wield  supreme  power  in  the  empire.  Duke  Huan 
of  Ts’i  opens  the  series  of  the  five  gi’eat  leaders,  whose 
power  by  far  outshone  that  of  the  Son  of  Heaven  and 
who  by  turns  were  virtually  the  rulers  of  China.  These 
leaders  are  known  as  the  wu-pa,  the  “Five  Mighty 
Ones,”  or  “Tyrants,”  interpreting  the  latter  word  in 
its  original  sense  of  “one  who  holds  power  not  by  right, 
but  by  might.”  The  five  states  thus  prominent  were 
those  of  Ts’i,  Sung,  Tsin,  Ts’in,  and  Ch’u;  and  their 
several  chiefs  were:  (1)  Duke  Huan  of  Ts’i  (685-643 
B.C.),  (2)  Duke  Siang  of  Sung  (650-637  n.c.),  (3)  Duke 
Won  of  Tsin  (636-628  b.c.),  (4)  Duke  Mu  of  Ts’in  (659 
-621  B.C.),  and  (5)  Prince,  or  King,  Chuang  of  Ch’u 
(613-591  B.C.). 

The  history  of  the  internal  wars  waged  during  this  period 
of  wrangling  for  leadership  is  given  in  detail  in  the  Tso~ 
chuan.  It  is  full  of  romance  and  has  left  its  traces  deeply 
engraved  in  the  heart  of  the  Chinese  nation.  No  one  could 
better  summarize  the  main  events  of  this  interesting  period 
than  the  late  Dr.  James  Legge,  who  had  just  finished  his 
great  edition  of  the  “ Spring  and  Autumn  Annals,”  when 
in  a lecture  delivered  at  Hongkong  in  March,  1873,'  he 
gave  a charming  sketch  of  what  he  called  “Two  Heroes 
of  Chinese  History.”  The  two  heroes  placed  before  his 
audience  by  the  venerable  lecturer  were  Duke  Huan 
of  Ts’i  and  Duke  Won  of  Tsin,  the  first  and  third  of  the 
“Five  Leaders”  respectively.  I shall  allow  Dr.  Legge  to 
resume  the  thread  of  history  where  I had  broken  it  in  de- 
scribing the  relations  between  Huan  and  his  great  minister 
Kuan-tzi. 

* See  China  Review,  vol.  i,  p.  370  seqq. 


THE  CENTURY  OF  THE  “FIVE  LEADERS” 


207 


Two  Heroes  of  Chinese  History 

“ Huan  and  Kuan-tzi  took  measures  in  the  first  place  to  strengthen 
the  resources  of  Ts’i  itself  and  then  ])roceeded  to  cultivate  the  good- 
will of  their  neighbors.  Its  territories  were  extended ; its  industries 
cultivated;  its  levies  well  trained;  a policy  of  forbearance  and 
generosity  displayed  in  its  external  relations.  The  natural  result 
was  that  it  became  the  asylum  of  the  fugitive  and  the  helper  of  the 
weak  and  oppressed.  Gradually  its  preeminence  was  recognized, 
and  Huan,  whenever  there  was  occasion,  would  assemble  several 
of  the  other  princes  and  preside  among  them,  all  engaging  by  cove- 
nant to  observe  the  statutes  of  Chou,  and  take  common  measures 
against  the  unruly.  By  and  by  the  King  of  Chou  [i.e.  the  emperor] 
acknowledged  the  position  which  Huan  had  secured  for  himself, 
and  gave  him  the  title  of  ‘President  of  Covenants,’  devolving  on 
him  at  the  same  time  the  duty  of  dealing  in  the  royal  name  with  all 
refractory  vassals.  With  the  barbarous  tribes  that  squatted  among 
the  feudal  States  and  occupied  the  country  beyond  them,  he  had 
many  conflicts,  and  very  much  broke  their  power.  In  660  [661] 
he  and  his  minister  Kuan-tzi  conducted  a great  expedition  against 
the  tribes  of  the  Hill  Jung,  who  had  reduced  the  State  or  Marquisate 
of  Yen,  lying  on  the  east  of  Ts’i  and  extending  nearly  to  the  present 
capital  of  China,  to  the  greatest  straits.  It  would  take  a whole 
lecture  to  describe  the  toils  which  they  underwent  and  the  per- 
tinacity with  which  they  followed  up  their  successes  through  a 
country  which  was  then  either  pathless  forest  or  howling  desert, 
where  there  were  no  supplies  of  water  or  food.  The  expedition 
was  entirely  successful.  The  chiefs  of  the  Hill  Jung  and  other 
tribes  were  slain,  and  the  tribes  themselves  extirpated  or  hopelessly 
dispersed.  The  Marquis  of  Yen  could  not  show  his  gratitude 
sufficiently  to  his  deliverer.  Unable  to  part  from  him,  he  eseorted 
him  past  the  boundary  of  his  own  state  nearly  twenty  miles  into 
Ts’i.  ‘You  have  transgressed,’  said  Huan  to  him,  ‘the  statute 
which  forbids  a prince  to  cross  the  boundaries  of  his  state  saving 
on  the  king’s  service.  But  you  must  not  suffer  for  it,  and  I here- 
with bestow  upon  you  all  the  tract  of  my  territory  over  which  we 
have  passed.’  ‘He  did  WTong  in  this,’  say  many  Chinese  writers; 
‘for  he  had  no  right  to  give  to  another  a foot  of  his  land  without 


208 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


the  king’s  authority.'  ‘He  may  have  done  wrong,’  say  others, 
‘but  the  wrong-doing  showed  the  kindness  of  his  heart  and  the 
magnanimity  of  his  nature.’ 

“Of  all  the  expeditions  which  Huan  undertook,  the  greatest 
was  one  in  655  [656]  against  the  great  State  of  Ch’u  in  the  south. 
The  lords  of  this  had  only  the  patent  of  viscounts  from  the  Kings 
of  Chou;  but  they  had  long  usurped  the  title  of  ‘King,’  and  it  was 
the  barest  acknowledgment  which  they  deigned  to  make  of  their 
vassalage.  The  feudal  states  proper  of  China  and  the  kings  lived 
in  a state  of  constant  apprehension  of  the  encroachments  of  Ch’u, 
which  year  by  year  with  untiring  determination  advanced  upon 
them.  It  was  evident  that,  unless  some  severe  check  were  inflicted 
upon  it,  it  would  ere  long  overflow  the  Middle  Land  with  its  bar- 
barous population  and  usages.  Kuan-tzi  had  long  seen  that,  to 
put  the  crown  upon  his  ruler’s  presidency,  he  must  contrive  to 
beat  back  the  advance  of  this  power.  Preparations  were  made  for 
some  years  for  an  expedition  against  it  and,  when  all  things  were 
ready,  an  opportunity  was  sought  to  burst  upon  it,  and  take  it  by 
surprise  and  unprepared.  And  this  seemed  to  be  afforded  in  the 
following  way.  A favorite  lady  of  Duke  Huan  was  a daughter 
of  the  house  of  Ts’ai,  the  southernmost  of  the  feudal  states,  and 
nearest  to  the  territories  of  Ch’u.  One  day  he  was  amusing  him- 
self with  her  in  a boat  upon  a lake,  though  he  had  a dread  of  the 
water.  The  lady  amused  herself  with  playing  on  this  weakness, 
and  moved  about  so  as  to  rock  the  boat.  The  Duke  got  angry 
and  told  her  to  desist,  but  she  would  not  do  so,  and  irritated  him 
still  more  by  taking  up  water  with  her  hands  and  casting  it  upon 
him.  The  consequence  was  that  he  sent  her  back  to  her  father, 
who  soon  after  found  another  husband  for  her.  This  Duke  Huan 
pretended  to  take  as  a great  insult,  and  giving  it  out  that  his  object 
was  to  punish  the  Marquis  of  Ts’ai,  in  the  year  which  I have  men- 
tioned, he  called  out  all  the  forces  of  his  own  state  and  seven  others, 
and  marched  in  grand  force  to  the  south.  The  real  object  was  to 
burst  with  this  great  host  upon  Ch’u.  That  state,  however,  was 
not  unprepared.  A favorite  eunuch  of  Huan’s  harem  had  let  out 
some  time  before  the  secret  of  the  expedition;  and  the  forces  of 
the  allies  found  themselves  confronted  in  the  present  Hii-chou  of 
Ho-nan  by  those  of  Ch’u.  A great  battle  seemed  imminent;  but 


THE  CENTURY  OF  THE  “FIVE  LK4DERS” 


209 


both  sides  were  afraid  to  hazard  such  a risk.  The  King  of  Ch’u 
was  brought  to  acknowledge  his  failure  in  duty  in  not  sending  tribute 
to  Chou  and  to  promise  reformation,  and  thereupon  a covenant 
was  entered  into,  and  both  armies  retired.  It  was  a lame  and 
impotent  conclusion  to  an  expedition  on  so  grand  a scale,  but  Ts’i 
had  rather  the  better  of  it.  The  dreaded  Ch’u  had  been  threatened 
and  obliged  to  slink  away ; and  all  China  breathed  more  freely  and 
resounded  with  the  praises  of  Duke  Huan. 

“ I will  mention  only  one  other  exploit  of  our  hero.  In  654  [655], 
having  heard  that  there  was  serious  disagreement  in  the  royal 
family  and  that  the  king  meant  to  degrade  his  eldest  son,  who  had 
been  declared  heir  to  the  throne,  — a proceeding  which  would 
produce  great  disorder  and  have  disastrous  consequences  as  a 
precedent  throughout  the  states,  — Huan  said  that  it  must  be  pre- 
vented, and  for  that  purpose  called  a meeting  of  the  states  at  a place 
in  the  present  department  of  Kui-to,  Ho-nan,  at  which  also  he  begged 
the  attendance  of  the  crown-prince.  This  was  intended  to  be  a 
public  recognition  of  the  prince  by  the  states  as  their  future  king. 
The  reigning  monarch  could  not  refuse  his  powerful  noble  and  sent 
his  son  to  the  meeting,  though  with  inward  dissatisfaction  and 
grumbling.  The  device  succeeded.  In  651  [652]  the  king  [Hui- 
wang]  died,  and  the  crown-prince  took  his  place  [as  Siang-wang], 
and  the  next  year  Huan  called  another  meeting  in  the  province  of 
Ho-nan,  in  the  department  of  K’ai-fong,  as  an  expression  of  loyalty 
to  the  new  sovereign.  To  this  assembly  the  king  sent  his  chief 
minister  with  a portion  of  the  flesh  which  he  had  used  a little  before 
in  sacrificing  to  the  founder  of  his  dynasty.  This  was  a special 
gift  to  Duke  Huan  of  the  royal  favor  and  could  only  be  received 
with  reverent  obeisance.  The  Duke  was  about  to  descend  from 
his  high  place  as  president  of  the  assembly  to  render  the  obeisance, 
when  the  king’s  minister  proclaimed  : ‘The  Son  of  Heaven  further 
charged  me  to  say  that  in  consideration  of  his  uncle’s  seventy  years, 
he  confers  on  him  an  additional  distinction;  he  shall  not  descend 
and  do  obeisance.’  ‘Heaven’s  Majesty,’  replied  our  hero,  ‘is  not 
far  from  me.  Shall  I,  Siau-pi  [the  duke’s  personal  name],  dare 
to  covet  this  favor  of  the  Son  of  Heaven,  and  not  descend  and  do 
obeisance?’  With  this  he  went  down  the  steps,  and  received  the 
gift  with  humble  homage. 


210 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


“ Mencius  has  preserved  for  us  the  five  articles  of  the  covenant 
which  was  entered  into  at  this  meeting.  The  first  was : ‘ Slay  the 
unfilial;  change  not  the  son  who  has  been  appointed  heir;  exalt 
not  a concubine  to  the  rank  of  wife.’  The  second:  ‘Honor  the 
worthy,  and  maintain  the  talented  to  give  distinction  to  the  vir- 
tuous. ’ The  third : ‘ Respect  the  old,  and  be  kind  to  the  young. 
Be  not  forgetful  of  strangers  and  travelers.’  The  fourth:  ‘Let 
no  oflices  be  hereditary,  and  let  not  officers  be  pluralists.  Let 
not  a ruler  take  it  on  himself  (without  the  authority  of  the  king) 
to  put  to  death  a great  officer.’  And  the  fifth : ‘Follow  no  crooked 
policy  in  making  embankments.  Impost  no  restrictions  on  the 
sale  of  grain.  Make  no  promotions  without  first  announcing 
them  to  the  king.’  It  was  then  said  in  conclusion:  ‘All  we  who 
have  united  in  this  covenant  shall  hereafter  maintain  amicable 
relations.’  * 

“Duke  Huan  was  now,  as  has  been  intimated,  about  seventy 
years  old,  and  his  course  was  drawing  to  a close.  In  645  [646]  his 
great  minister  died.  Kuan-tzi  was  aware  of  the  defects  of  his 
master’s  character  as  well  as  his  excellence,  and  with  his  dying 
breath  warned  him  of  the  perils  to  which  he  exposed  himself  by 
the  confidence  he  reposed  in  several  unworthy  favorites.  The 
chief  of  these  were  his  cook  and  the  master  of  the  eunuchs.  The 
former,  it  is  related,  had  won  his  confidence  by  a monstrous  act. 
The  Marquis  was  fond  of  the  pleasures  of  the  table,  and  was  one 
day  talking  with  the  cook,  who  was  a great  artiste,  about  the  various 
dishes  which  he  had  enjoyed.  Kid,  and  lamb,  and  veal,  and  leveret 
had  all  their  attractions  for  him,  and  he  added  in  a joke,  ‘I  wonder 
how  child  would  taste;  I have  never  tasted  that  dish.’  Next  day 
there  was  the  flesh  of  some  young  creature  on  his  table,  which  had 
a peculiar  delicacy.  What  would  it  be,  — like  lamb  or  veal,  and 
yet  better  than  either  of  them  ? He  called  the  cook,  and  asked  him, 
and  was  told  that  in  consequence  of  his  remarks  the  day  before,  the 
cook  had  taken  his  own  child,  put  it  to  death,  dressed  it,  and  served 
it  on  the  table.  The  Marquis  was  indignant,  and  ordered  the  ar- 
tiste away.  His  stomach  rose,  and  got  rid  of  what  he  had  eaten ; 
but  on  reflection  he  said,  ‘ Surely  this  man  is  faithful  and  devoted 
to  me,  having  killed  his  own  child,  in  consequence  of  my  foolish 
* Cf.  Von  der  Gabclentz,  op.  cit.,  p.  142. 


THE  CENTURY  OF  THE  “FIVE  LEADERS” 


211 


words.’  The  cook  kept  his  place  in  his  favor;  but  the  Minister 
reasoned  differently,  and  said : ‘ If  the  cook  could  kill  his  child  to 
please  you,  what  will  he  not  do,  if  he  can  gain  his  own  ends  by 
taking  a course  adverse  to  you?’  The  Marquis,  however,  would 
not  take  his  advice,  and  when  Kuan-tzi  was  taken  away,  he  fell, 
in  the  dotage  of  his  old  age,  entirely  into  the  hands  of  his  unworthy 
parasites,  dying  a most  miserable  death  in  642  [643]. 

“He  had  been  addicted  to  the  pleasures  of  the  harem  as  much 
as  to  those  of  the  table,  and  had  by  five  different  ladies  five  sons, 
all  come  to  age,  and  all  eager  to  succeed  him.  Their  mothers 
caballed  with  the  favorites  and  high  officers,  each  wishing  to  secure 
the  state  for  her  own  son.  His  attendants  utterly  neglected  the 
Marquis  in  his  sickness,  forged  a notice  that  he  wished  to  be  left 
alone,  and  allowed  him  to  perish  in  his  palace  of  hunger.  One  of 
his  sons  was  raised  by  them  to  the  marquisate,  the  others  raging, 
it  is  said,  like  so  many  young  tigers.  Amid  the  confusion,  the  corpse 
of  the  mighty  president  lay  for  months  unburied,  only  to  be  entombed 
at  last,  according  to  barbarous  practice,  with  a multitude  of  women 
and  others,  buried  alive  with  him,  to  be  his  servants  in  another  world. 
So  passed  away  the  glory  of  Duke  Huan.  His  sons  continued  at 
variance,  and  four  of  them  came  to  the  marquisate,  each  one  as 
it  were  over  the  dead  body  of  a brother.  The  presidency  of  Ts’i 
among  the  states  was  overthrown.  We  have  to  go  down  the  stream 
of  Chinese  history  for  nearly  three  hundred  years  before  we  find  it 
again  in  the  strength  to  which  Huan  had  raised  it,  though  his  name 
survived  and  still  survives  ‘ to  point  a moral,  or  adorn  a tale.' 

“ I must  hurry  to  and  through  my  other  subject,  — Duke  Won 
of  Tsin.‘  The  presidency  of  Ts’i,  I have  said,  perished  with  Huan 
and  his  minister  Kuan-tzi.  The  idea  of  such  an  institution,  how- 
ever, had  now  become  familiar  throughout  the  kingdom,  and  one 
prince  and  another  endeavored  to  assert  it  for  themselves  and  their 
states,  but  in  vain.  It  was  upon  the  Marquis  of  Tsin  that  at  last 
Huan’s  mantle  fell.^ 

* Throughout  incorrectly  spelled  Ts’in  in  the  China  Review. 

^ It  should  be  noted  that  Dr.  Legge’s  account  here  skips  the  second 
of  the  “Five  Leaders,”  Duke  Siang  of  Sung.  Huan  and  Won,  se- 
lected as  the  “two  heroes”  of  his  lecture,  may,  however,  be  said  to 
be  typical  characters  of  the  period. 


212 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


“To  find  him  we  must  go  from  the  east  to  the  west  of  the  then 
China;  from  Shan-tung  to  Shan-si.  There  a cadet  of  the  Chou 
family  had  been  [in  1107  b.c.]  invested  with  the  State  of  Tsin,  in 
the  present  department  of  T’ai-yiian,  soon  after  the  rise  of  the 
dynasty.  It  was  at  first  small,  and  long  continued  so,  but  its  posi- 
tion afforded  it  great  opportunities  for  enlarging  its  territory  and 
increasing  its  population  by  reducing  and  absorbing  the  wild  tribes 
lying  to  the  north  and  east  of  it,  as  soon  as  it  became  consolidated 
in  itself.  Soon  after  Huan  became  Marquis  in  Ts’i,  a certain  Kui- 
chu,  known  in  history  as  Duke  Hien,  obtained  the  same  dignity 
in  Tsin  and  held  it  for  twenty-six  years  [676-651  b.c.].  He  was  a 
worthless  man,  but  his  rule  was  not  devoid  of  vigor,  and  he  added 
to  his  state  by  subjugating  several  smaller  ones  in  its  neighborhood, 
and  was  recognized  by  the  more  civilized  states  on  the  east  as  an 
important  member  of  the  feudal  kingdom.  He  had  three  sons  by 
different  ladies,  all  grown  up,  and  the  eldest  of  them,  recognized  as 
heir  to  the  state,  the  second  of  them,  with  whom  we  have  now  to  do, 
being  named  Ch’ung-ir.  In  the  year  671  [672]  he  had  subjugated 
a wild  tribe  called  the  Li-jung,  and  brought  back  with  them  the 
daughter  of  the  chief,  a young  lady  of  wonderful  personal  attractions. 
Having  taken  her  and  a cousin  of  hers  into  his  harem,  he  became 
infatuated  by  their  fascinations,  and  each  of  them  soon  presented 
him  with  a son.  The  usual  consequences  followed.  His  regards 
were  soon  away  from  his  older  sons,  and  it  was  determined  that 
these  young  children  should  supersede  them  in  the  state.  They 
were  sent  away  from  the  court,  and  placed  in  charge  of  different 
cities  at  a distance.  But  this  did  not  satisfy  the  new  mistress  of 
the  seraglio;  she  wrought  until  the  eldest  son,  after-time  heir 
apparent,  was  driven  to  commit  suicide,  and  an  armed  force  was 
sent  to  each  of  the  cities  held  by  his  two  brothers  to  deal  with  them, 
and  bring  their  dead  bodies  to  the  capital. 

“ Ch’ung-ir  had  been  placed  in  charge  of  P’u,  the  people  of  which 
had  become  attached  to  him,  and  proposed  that  he  should  lead  them 
against  the  assailants.  ‘That  would  be,’  said  he,  ‘to  strive  with 
my  father,  and  a great  crime.  I will  rather  fly.’  And  fly  he  did, 
making  a very  narrow  escape  from  the  eunuch  who  led  the  force 
against  him.  The  latter  was  close  upon  him,  and  caught  hold  of  his 
sleeve,  as  he  was  leaping  over  a wall  to  get  out  of  the  city.  A 


THE  CENTURY  OF  THE  “ FIVE  LEADERS  ” 


213 


sword  blow  missed  the  prince,  but  cut  off  half  the  sleeve,  which 
remained  in  the  hand  of  his  pursuer. 

“From  P’u  Ch’ung-ir  fled  to  a northern  tribe  of  the  Ti,  where  he 
continued  with  about  a dozen  of  his  relations  and  partisans,  who 
had  escaped  with  him,  for  twelve  years,  — the  chief  being  fond  of 
him,  and  having  given  him  as  a wife  a beautiful  captive  whom  he 
had  taken  in  a war  with  a neighboring  tribe.  In  the  meantime  his 
father  died  in  649  [650],  leaving  the  state  to  his  young  child  by  the 
chieftainess  of  the  Li-jung.  There  was  great  confusion  in  the 
state,  and  there  came  in  the  interference  of  the  Earl  of  Ts’in,  the 
large  and  growing  state  on  the  west  in  the  present  Shen-si.  He 
was  married  to  a sister  of  the  two  fugitive  princes,  and  he  sent  to 
them  in  their  different  exiles,  proposing  to  each  on  certain  condi- 
tions to  establish  him  in  Tsin.  Ch’ung-ir  declined  the  offer  in  a 
sentence,  which  has  become  celebrated:  ‘A  fugitive  as  I am,  it  is 
not  the  getting  of  the  state  which  is  precious  in  my  sight,  but  the 
maintenance  of  my  benevolence  and  my  filial  piety.’  His  younger 
brother  eagerly  accepted  the  offers  of  Ts’in,  and  was  accordingly, 
on  terms  disgraceful  to  himself  and  ruinous  to  the  state,  made  Mar- 
quis of  Tsin.  He  is  known  as  Duke  Hui.  He  held  the  state  for 
fifteen  years,  — years  of  trouble  and  disaster ; and  one  of  his  earliest 
measures  was  an  attempt  to  take  the  life  of  his  brother  among  the 
Ti  [645  B.c.].  This  it  was  which  determined  Ch’ung-ir  to  flee  to  a 
more  distant  and  safer  refuge.  Calling  to  him  his  Ti  wife,  he  said 
to  her : ‘Wait  for  me  five  and  twenty  years,  and  if  I have  not  come 
back  then,  you  can  take  another  husband.’  ‘I  am  now  twenty- 
five,’  said  the  lady,  ‘and  if  I am  to  be  married  again  after  other 
twenty-five,  it  shall  be  to  my  coffin.  I will  wait  for  you.’ 

“The  asylum  which  he  proposed  for  himself  was  Ts’i,  where  he 
would  be  under  the  wing  of  the  great  Duke  Huan.  Passing  with 
his  followers  through  the  State  of  Wei  on  his  way  to  Ts’i,  he  was 
treated  discourteously  by  its  Marquis,  and  reduced  to  such  straits 
that  he  had  one  day  to  beg  food  from  a countryman.  The  man  was 
churlish,  and  offered  him  a clod  of  earth.  Indignant,  he  was  about 
to  scourge  the  fellow  with  his  whip,  when  one  of  his  followers 
interfered,  saying : ‘ It  is  heaven’s  gift ; a gift  of  the  soil,  a happy 
omen.’  Ch’ung,  who  bowed  to  the  speaker,  let  the  man  go,  and 
took  the  clod  with  him  in  his  carriage. 


214 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


“Duke  Huan  received  him  kindly  in  Ts’i,  gave  him  as  a wife  a 
relative  of  his  own,  and  nobly  entertained  both  him  and  his  fol- 
lowers. The  prince  abandoned  himself  for  years  to  the  enjoyment 
of  his  position,  much  to  the  dissatisfaction  of  his  followers.  They 
had  always  been  confident  in  his  fortunes,  and  in  their  own  as 
associated  with  him.  They  were  determined  that  he  should  yet 
be  Marquis  of  Tsin ; and  one  day,  going  with  him  a little  distance  out 
of  the  capital,  they  halted  under  the  shade  of  a large  mulberry  tree, 
and  insisted  on  his  leaving  Ts’i.  It  so  happened  that  a girl  from 
his  harem  was  in  the  tree,  gathering  mulberry  leaves  for  silkworms, 
and  overheard  all  that  was  said.  Returning  to  the  city,  after  they 
had  broken  up  their  conference,  she  reported  all  to  the  Lady  Kiang, 
his  wife.  That  lady  rewarded  her  by  causing  her  to  be  put  to  death, 
that  the  thing  might  not  get  talked  about ; and  at  night  talked  the 
matter  over  with  the  prince.  He  denied  the  design  of  departure, 
and  said  he  wished  no  greater  happiness  than  to  continue  to  live 
with  her.  ‘And  shall  I,’  said  she,  ‘by  keeping  you  in  the  lap  of 
pleasure,  contribute  to  ruin  your  fame  ? ’ She  communicated  with 
his  followers,  made  him  dead  drunk,  and  had  him  carried  off  by 
them.  When  he  came  to  himself,  they  were  many  miles  from  the 
capital  of  Ts’i;  and  though  he  stormed  against  them  for  their 
deed,  he  consented  at  last  to  go  with  them. 

“After  various  adventures,  and  passing  through  the  States  of 
Ts’au,  Sung,  and  Chong,  he  found  himself  in  Ch’u,  at  the  court  of 
the  king  who  was  the  sole  rival  of  Duke  Huan.  There  he  was 
honorably  treated  as  he  had  been  in  Ts’i.  There  appears  to  have 
been  something  fascinating  about  his  appearance  and  manners. 
He  had  double  pupils  in  his  eyes,  and  his  ribs  presented  the  appear- 
ance of  being  one  piece  of  solid  bone.  The  King  of  Ch’u  auspiced  a 
great  future  for  him,  and  after  feasting  him  one  day  in  his  palace, 
said  to  him : ‘ If  you  return  to  Tsin,  and  become  its  Marquis,  how 
will  you  recompense  my  kindness  to  you?’  Ch’ung-ir  replied: 
‘Ladies,  gems,  and  silks  your  Majesty  has.  Plumes,  hair,  ivory, 
and  hides  are  all  produced  in  your  country ; those  of  them  that  come 
to  Tsin  are  but  your  superabundance.  What  then  should  I have 
wherewith  to  recompense  your  kindness?’  ‘Nevertheless,’  urged 
the  other,  ‘how  would  you  recompense  me?’  ‘If,’  said  Ch’ung-Ir, 
‘by  your  Majesty’s  powerful  influence  I shall  recover  the  state  of 


THE  CENTURY  OF  THE  “FIVE  LEADERS" 


215 


Tsin,  should  Tsin  and  Ch’u  go  to  war,  and  meet  in  the  plain  of  the 
Middle  Land,  I will  withdraw  before  you  three  stages  of  ten  miles 
each.  If  then  I do  not  receive  your  commands  to  stop  from  hos- 
tilities, with  my  whip  and  my  bow  in  my  left  hand,  and  with  my 
quiver  on  my  right,  I will  manoeuvre  with  your  Majesty.’ 

“Many  of  the  King  of  Ch’u’s  officers  would  have  had  their  king 
take  the  opportunity  to  make  away  with  the  prince  and  his  followers 
as  dangerous  to  the  fortunes  of  their  country ; but  the  king  was  of 
too  noble  a nature  to  listen  to  them.  ‘The  Prince,’  said  he,  ‘is  a 
grand  character,  and  yet  distinguished  by  moderation,  highly 
accomplished  and  courteous.  His  followers  are  severely  grave  and 
yet  generous,  loyal  and  of  untiring  ability.  Tsin  will  yet  be  his. 
When  Heaven  intends  to  prosper  a man,  who  can  stop  him  ? He 
that  opposes  Heaven  must  incur  great  guilt.’ 

“He  then  sent  Ch’ung-ir  away  with  an  escort  to  Ts’in,  where  the 
way  was  soon  opened  for  his  return  to  Tsin,  his  native  state.  His 
unworthy  brother,  Duke  Hui  [650-638  b.c.],  was  by  this  time  dead; 
and  his  son,  who  had  been  a hostage  in  Ts’in,  and  received  to  wife 
a daughter  of  the  Earl,  had  broken  his  parole,  left  his  wife,  and 
stolen  away  to  Tsin.  The  Earl  was  indignant,  insisted  on  the 
lady’s  taking  Ch’ung-ir  as  a husband  in  room  of  his  runaway  nephew, 
and  prepared  to  lead  an  expedition  to  establish  the  prince  in  Tsin. 
The  lady  declaimed,  but  was  obliged  to  submit,  and  in  635  b.c. 
[636],  after  an  exile  of  nineteen  years,  Ch’ung-ir  once  more  entered 
Tsin.  He  encountered  no  serious  opposition.  His  nephew  was 
put  to  death,  and  with  the  general  satisfaction  of  the  people,  he 
was  hailed  as  Marquis. 

“ But  he  was  now  getting  old.  Only  eight  years  of  life  remained ; 
but  during  that  short  time  he  accomplished  much  for  Tsin  and  for 
China.  His  long  experience  of  adversity  had  been  of  use  to  him, 
and  made  him  fruitful  in  expedients,  and  gave  him  much  self-com- 
mand. He  nobly  rewarded  those  who  had  faithfully  adhered  to 
him  through  so  long  a period  of  trial  and  difficulty,  and  towards 
the  partisans  of  his  brother  and  nephew  he  manifested  a generous 
forbearance.  His  wives  from  the  Ti,  from  Ts’i  and  from  Ts’in  all 
came  to  him ; and  there  was  a most  edifying  contest  among  them 
as  to  which  should  be  Marchioness  and  mistress  of  the  harem,  and 
he  decided  at  last  in  favor  of  the  lady  Kiang  of  Ts’i. 


216 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


“The  year  after  his  return  an  opportunity  occurred  to  do  good 
service  to  the  king,  the  same  for  whom  Duke  Huan  secured  the 
throne.  The  king  was  now  a fugitive  in  Chong,  driven  from  the 
capital  by  the  rebellion  of  a younger  brother.  Duke  Won  raised  his 
forces,  and  went  to  his  relief.  The  rebel  was  defeated  and  slain, 
and  the  king  restored  to  his  place. 

“Three  years  after,  in  631  [632],  the  thing  occurred  which 
Won  had  prognosticated  in  Ch’u,  the  king  of  the  country  and 
he  meeting  in  arms  in  the  plain  of  the  Middle  Land.  All  the  mih- 
tary  forces  of  Tsin  were  collected  in  the  field.  Ch'u  had  with  it 
the  levies  of  Chong  and  Ch’on,  and  on  the  side  of  Tsin  were  aux- 
iliaries from  Sung,  from  Ts’i  and  from  Ts’in.  Nearly  a thousand 
chariots  of  war  on  either  side  shook  the  ground.  Mindful  of  what 
he  had  said  in  Ch’u,  Duke  Won  on  three  successive  days  retreated 
before  the  forces  of  that  State,  a distance  altogether  of  thirty  miles, 
taking  post  at  last  at  a place  called  Ch’ong-p’u,  in  the  present  dis- 
trict of  Ts’au,  Dept,  of  Ts’au-chou,  Shan-tung.  There  the  battle 
was  fought,  — if  not  one  of  the  great  battles  of  the  world,  yet  one 
of  the  great  battles  of  China;  a battle  of  civilization  against  bar- 
barism. Ch’u  was  entirely  defeated.  What  Huan  of  Ts’i  had 
failed  in  doing  was  now  accomplished  by  Won  of  Tsin.  Immedi- 
ately on  hearing  of  the  result,  the  king  sent  commissioners  to  the 
camp  of  Tsin  to  hail  the  Marquis  as  President  of  the  States,  and 
confer  on  him  all  the  insignia  of  that  appointment.  In  the  winter 
of  that  year,  he  presided  over  a great  meeting  of  the  princes  or 
representatives  of  ten  States,  at  which  he  required  the  presence 
even  of  the  king  himself,  in  the  present  district  of  Won,  Depart- 
ment Huai-k’ing,  Ho-nan.  Confucius  condemns  him  for  requiring 
the  presence  of  the  king,  and  in  his  own  account  of  the  meeting 
has  tried  to  conceal  the  fact.  Won’s  glory  was  at  its  height.  He 
was  unchallengeably  the  foremost  man  in  the  kingdom,  and  re- 
turned to  Tsin  to  pursue  fresh  measures  to  increase  the  military 
strength  of  the  State.  Some  writers  think  that  he  had  it  now  in 
mind  to  displace  the  dynasty  of  Chou,  and  establish  himself  as  King 
of  China.  If  he  had  been  a younger  man,  I think  he  would  have 
done  .so.  But  his  battle  of  life  was  nearly  over;  and,  four  years 
after  the  great  victory  of  Ch’ong-p’u,  he  breathed  his  last  in  his 
chief  city,  leaving  to  the  son  whom  he  had  declared  his  successor 


THE  CENTURY  OF  THE  “FIVE  LEADERS” 


217 


quiet  possession  of  Tsin,  and  to  that  State  a presidency  in  the  king- 
dom, which  was  maintained  for  nearly  two  hundred  years.”  ^ 

This  graphic  account  of  two  Chinese  “heroes,”  as  Legge 
calls  them,  will  indicate  what  we  might  expect  should  we 
enter  more  deeply  into  the  history  of  this  period.  It  will 
be  seen  that  the  ups  and  downs  in  the  life  of  the  more  power- 
ful federal  states  were  greatly  dependent  on  the  personal 
qualities  of  their  leaders.  Yet  it  may  be  said  that  the  hero 
who  initiated  the  period  of  the  “Five  Leaders”  was  Duke 
Huan  of  Ts’i,  who  rose  to  the  high  position  he  held  among 
the  confederation  of  dukes  and  princes  by  following  the 
advice  of  his  great  minister  Kuan-tzi.  This  advice  led 
him,  on  the  one  hand,  to  adopt  such  measures  as  would  in 
reality  unite  the  greatest  power  in  his  government ; on  the 
other,  to  be  absolutely  loyal  to  his  emperor,  the  traditional 
head  of  the  confederation.  Without  this  loyalty  he  could 
have  scarcely  succeeded  in  maintaining  his  position;  and 
with  all  the  troubles  that  in  subsequent  periods  created 
discord  among  the  contending  states  and  opposition  from 
one  side  or  another  to  imperial  authority,  it  was  that  spirit 
of  loyalty,  the  respect  due  to  the  heir  of  ancient  thrones  in 
the  person  of  the  emperor,  whose  main  duty  and  privilege 
it  was  to  bring  sacrifice  to  the  spirits  of  his  ancestors,  which 
held  together  the  shaky  framework  of  the  Chou  dynasty. 
This  loyalty,  based  in  its  main  effect  on  what  may  be  called 
the  religious  feeling  of  the  nation,  in  which  the  most  con- 


* In  reproducing  this  account  of  Dr.  Legge’ s lecture,  taken  from 
the  China  Review,  I have  been  obliged  to  correct  quite  a number 
of  misprints.  I have  also  changed  the  spelling  of  Chinese  names 
so  as  to  conform  with  that  adopted  in  the  present  work.  It  should 
be  understood  that  Legge’ s dates  have  to  be  advanced  one  year 
throughout,  in  order  to  correspond  with  the  chronology  of  Western 
history. 


218 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


flicting  interests  united,  ancestor  worship,  would  ever  and 
ever  again  remind  the  disloyally  inclined  that  they  had  to 
do  what  their  ancestors  in  remote  antiquity  had  done  in 
looking  upon  the  Son  of  Heaven,  whether  wielding  his 
power  or  not,  as  the  ruler  of  the  world  by  the  grace  of  God. 
With  all  its  misfortunes  the  Chou  dynasty  was  upheld  by 
this  loyalty,  feeble  though  it  may  have  been  among  the 
powerful  chiefs;  and  nothing  short  of  the  destruction  of 
every  memory  of  what  had  been  sacred  to  their  forefathers, 
in  many  generations  could,  as  we  shall  see  later  on,  succeed 
in  temporarily  disconnecting  the  nation  from  its  ancestors. 

§ 42.  Hi-wang  (681-677  b.c.) 

Hi-wang,  Chuang-wang’s  son,  reigned  only  five  years, 
during  which  time,  as  we  have  seen,  Huan,  Duke  of  Ts’i, 
was  the  mainstay  of  power  in  the  empire.  He  was  followed 
by  his  son  Hui-wang. 

§ 43.  Hui-wang  (676-652  b.c.) 

There  was  some  trouble  in  the  succession,  one  of  his 
uncles  posing  as  a pretender.  During  his  reign  Duke  Huan 
of  Ts’i,  who  had  favored  the  king’s  succession,  continued 
to  be  as  powerful  as  he  was  loyal  to  the  imperial  house. 
Hui-wang  was  followed  by  his  son  Siang-wang. 

§ 44.  Siang-wang  (651-619  b.c.) 

During  the  first  year  of  this  king’s  reign  Duke  Huan  of 
Ts’i  presided  at  the  covenant  of  princes  described  in  Dr. 
Legge’s  lecture.  Duke  Huan  died  in  643  b.c.,  leaving  five 
sons  fighting  each  other  in  Ts’i,  of  whom  Duke  Hiau  was 


THE  CENTURY  OF  THE  “FIVE  LEADERS” 


219 


finally  established  as  his  successor  under  the  assistance  of 
a neighboring  prince,  Duke  Siang  of  Sung.  Sung  was  a 
central  state  comprising  parts  of  the  present  Ho-nan  and 
Kiang-su,  and  its  Duke  Siang  henceforth  became  the  suc- 
cessor of  Duke  Huan  as  second  of  the  “Five  Leaders.” 
His  great  opponent  was  the  king  of  Ch’u  who  ruled  over 
the  south  as  Ch’ong-wang  (671-626  b.c.).  The  contest  for 
power  ended  with  the  defeat  of  Siang,  who  was  wounded 
in  a battle  against  Ch’u.  He  died  in  637  b.c.,  leaving  be- 
hind him  a name  not  nearly  as  popular  a?  that  of  his  great 
colleagues  Huan  and  Won.  The  latter  had  just  entered 
his  native  state  and  become  the  ruler  of  Tsin,  in  which  ca- 
pacity he  had  an  opportunity  to  be  of  great  service  to  the 
king  in  fighting  the  Jung-ti  and  in  reinstating  him  in  his 
capital,  from  which  he  had  been  obliged  to  flee.  He 
earned  the  gratitude  of  the  king,  who  invested  him  with 
large  tracts  of  land  and,  by  appointing  him  president  of  the 
covenant  of  the  feudal  princes,  raised  him  to  the  leadership 
as  third  among  the  Wu-pa.  The  state  of  Ch’u,  as  we  have 
seen,  continued  to  make  trouble  until  Duke  Won  fought 
the  great  battle  of  Ch’ong-p’u  in  632  b.c.  Duke  Won  of 
Tsin  died  in  628  b.c.  His  son,  Duke  Siang,  was  not  able 
to  hold  his  own  in  a feud  against  Duke  Mu  of  Ts’in  (reigned 
659-621  B.C.),  who  by  his  victory  became  the  fourth  among 
the  great  leaders,  which  dignity  he  held  only  for  a few  years 
down  to  his  death  in  621  b.c.  Siang-wang,  the  emperor, 
was  followed  at  his  death  by  his  son  K’ing-wang. 

§ 45.  K’ing-wang  (618-613  b.c.) 

Under  K’ing-wang  the  imperial  prestige  had  become  so 
low  that  even  the  king’s  treasury  was  found  insufficient  to 


220 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


pay  the  deceased  emperor’s  burial  expenses,  and  a loan  had 
to  be  raised  from  the  prosperous  state  of  Lu.  K’ing-wang 
was  succeeded  by  his  son  K’uang-wang. 

§ 46.  K’uang-wang  (612-607  b.c.) 

The  state  of  Tsin,  which  took  the  lead  with  its  duke, 
Won,  had  under  his  successors  become  the  victim  of  a crazy 
ruler,  Duke  Ling  (620-607  b.c.),  a cruel  tyrant  who  shot 
his  subjects  like  game  and  would  not  listen  to  the  serious 
remonstrances  of  his  excellent  minister  Chau  Tun,  whom 
he  unsuccessfully  tried  to  do  away  with.  Chau  Tun  was 
the  son  of  Chau  Ts’ui,  the  friend  and  faithful  companion 
of  Duke  Won  during  his  voluntary  banishment  and  his 
Tartar  wife.  Chau  Ts’ui  had  been  rewarded  with  the  post 
of  prime  minister  under  Duke  Won,  and  Chau  Tun  had 
become  his  successor  in  this  office.  The  persecution  of  his 
mad  master  caused  him  to  take  to  flight,  but  he  was  recalled 
and  reinstated  after  one  of  his  relatives  had  slain  the 
duke.  The  court  historian  laid  the  blame  of  this  crime 
upon  Chau  Tun,  whose  influence  did  not  suffice  to  prevent 
it,  the  hi.storians  holding  that  as  minister  he  ought  to  have 
punished  the  perpetrator  of  a duke’s  murder.  K’uang- 
wang  was  followed  by  his  brother  Ting-wang. 


§ 47.  Ting-wang  (606-586  b.c.) 

Under  this  reign  an  event  took  place  which,  better  than 
anything  else,  characterizes  the  situation  during  this  period. 
The  sacredness  of  the  imperial  throne  was,  as  we  have  seen, 
in  a large  measure  connected  with  the  king’s  duties  in 
bringing  sacrifice  to  the  spirits  of  his  great  ancestors. 


THE  CENTURY  OF  THE  “FIVE  LEADERS” 


221 


From  them  the  Chou  family  had  inherited  the  celebrated 
tripods,  said  to  have  been  cast  by  the  Emperor  Yii,  upon 
which  maps  and  records  of  the  nine  divisions  of  his  empire 
were  engraved.  These  Nine  Tripods  (kiu-ting)  had  ever 
since  passed  from  dynasty  to  dynasty  as  emblems  of  the 
imperial  power,  as  it  were.  We  have  seen  that  Wu-wang 
on  his  ascension  to  the  throne  (1122  b.c.)  took  particular 
care  to  transfer  the  Nine  Tripods,  which  he  had  found  in  the 
imperial  treasury  of  the  Shang,  to  his  new  capital,  and  the 
Chou  emperors  had  ever  since  regarded  them  as  emblems 
of  their  dignity.  In  606  b.c.  Viscount  Chuang  of  Ch’u, 
“King  of  Ch’u,”  according  to  the  self-assumed  title  of 
several  generations,  had  successfully  made  war  on  some 
Hunnic  tribes  in  the  northwest.  On  his  return  he  had  to 
touch  the  territory  of  the  imperial  domain.  Ting-wang 
sent  an  officer  to  him  with  congratulations  and  presents, 
when  it  occurred  to  the  powerful  vassal  to  make  fun  of 
the  emperor’s  weakness  by  asking  about  the  size  and 
weight  of  his  tripods.  The  ambassador  promptly  replied 
that  the  strength  of  the  kingdom  depends  on  the  sovereign’s 
virtue.  He  added : — 

“Anciently  when  Hia  was  distinguished  for  its  virtue,  the 
distant  regions  sent  pictures  of  the  remarkable  objects  in  them. 
The  nine  pastors  [i.e.  governors]  sent  in  the  metal  of  their 
provinces,  and  the  tripods  were  cast,  with  representations  on 
them  of  these  objects.  All  the  objects  were  represented,  and  in- 
structions were  given  for  the  preparations  to  be  made  in  reference 
to  them,  so  that  the  people  might  know  the  sprites  and  evil  things. 
Thus  the  people,  when  they  went  among  the  rivers,  marshes,  hills, 
and  forests,  did  not  meet  with  the  injurious  things,  and  the  hill- 
sprites,  monstrous  things,  and  water-sprites,  did  not  meet  with 
them  to  do  them  injury.  Hereby  a harmony  was  secured  between 
the  high  and  the  low,  and  all  enjoyed  the  blessing  of  Heaven. 


222 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


When  the  virtue  of  Ki4,  the  last  emperor  of  the  Hia  dynasty, 
was  obscured,  the  tripods  were  transferred  to  Shang  for  600 
years.  Chou-sin  of  Shang  proved  cruel  and  oppressive,  and  they 
were  transferred  to  Chou.  When  the  virtue  is  commendable  and 
brilliant,  the  tripods,  though  they  were  small,  would  be  heavy; 
when  it  gives  place  to  its  reverse,  to  darkness  and  disorder,  though 
they  were  large,  they  would  be  light.  Heaven  blesses  intelligent 
virtue;  on  that  its  favor  rests.  Ch’ong-wang  fixed  the  tripods  in 
Kia-ju  and  divined  that  the  dynasty  should  extend  through  thirty 
reigns,  over  700  years.  Though  the  virtue  of  Chou  is  decayed, 
the  decree  of  Heaven  is  not  yet  changed.  The  weight  of  the  tri- 
pods may  not  yet  be  inquired  about.”  ' 

The  gentle  rebuff  involved  in  this  reply  seems  to  show 
that  imperial  authority  was  not  yet  at  its  lowest  ebb;  for 
we  do  not  read  that  Chuang-wang  took  the  matter  amiss. 
The  manner  in  which  the  anecdote,  however,  is  told  speaks 
in  favor  of  the  genuineness  of  the  Tso-chuan.  The  thirty 
reigns  which  Ch’ong-wang  gave  to  the  owners  of  the 
tripods  were  in  reality  thirty-three,  and  the  700  years 
proved  in  reality  to  be  866,  or,  by  the  chronology  of  the 
Bamboo  Book  annals,  805.  Had  this  passage,  like  so 
many  other  texts  ascribed  to  the  Chou  period,  been  tampered 
with  by  Han  editors,  they  would  have  inserted  figures 
nearer  those  stated  in  the  acknowledged  history  of  the 
period  and  have  given  the  modern  critic  an  opportunity 
to  look  upon  Ch’ong-wang’s  divination  as  a vaticinium  ex 
eventu. 

Chuang-wang,  the  "king”  of  the  state  of  Ch’u,  was  now 
by  far  the  most  powerful  among  the  confederates;  and, 
loyal  as  he  was  to  the  imperial  house,  he  became  the  fifth 
among  the  great  leaders.  Ch’u  in  the  south  was  separated 
from  the  great  rival  state  Tsin  partly  by  the  imperial 

* From  the  Tso-chuan,  translated  by  Lcgge,  Ch’un-ts’iu,  p.  293. 


THE  CENTURY  OF  THE  “FIVE  LEADERS” 


223 


domain  on  the  west  and  partly  by  the  state  of  Chong 
adjoining  this  in  the  east.  Chuang-wang’s  leadership  was 
greatly  concerned  in  his  authority  over  that  state  of  Chong, 
disputed  by  its  northern  neighbor,  the  state  of  Tsin.  The 
latter  had  considerably  declined  in  power  since  Duke  Won’s 
demise.  The  combined  forces  of  Tsin  and  Chong  were 
beaten  by  the  Ch’u  army,  when  Chong  was  placed  under 
the  supremacy  of  Ch’u.  Chuang-wang  died  in  591  b.c. 


VII 

THE  AGE  OF  LAU-TZI  AND  CONFUCIUS 


Q 


VII 

THE  AGE  OF  LAU-TZf  AND  CONFUCIUS 

§ 48.  Kien-wang  (585-572  b.c.) 

UNDER  Kien-wang,  Ting-wang’s  son,  the  rivalship 
between  the  states  of  Ch’u  and  Tsin  concerning  the 
supremacy  in  the  central  state  of  Chong  continued, 
and  now  Tsin  was  again  victorious  and  obtained  the  su- 
premacy in  Chong.  Kien-wang  was  followed  by  his  son 
Ling-wang. 


§ 49.  Ling-wang  (571-545  b.c.) 

Under  this  ruler  the  jealousies  among  the  contending 
states  continued.  The  number  of  these  states  was  now 
increased  by  two,  destined  to  a certain  role  even  in  a cursory 
review  of  China’s  history,  the  states  of  Wu  and  Yiie.  Wu 
adjoined  Ch’u  on  the  east;  it  occupied  the  country  on  both 
sides  near  the  mouth  of  the  Yang-tzi  River  in  the  present 
province  of  Kiang-su.  Yiie  adjoined  it  in  the  south  and 
at  first  approximately  corresponded  to  the  present  province 
of  Ch’o-kiang.  Later  on  it  extended  farther  and  farther 
south,  when  two  lands  of  Yiie  were  distinguished,  occupy- 
ing the  entire  southern  coast  provinces  of  China,  of  which 
the  Nan-yiie,  “Southern  Yiie,”  comprising  Kuang-tung, 
Kuang-si,  Tung-king  and  adjoining  parts,  became  the 
kingdom  of  the  southern  Man  barbarians. 

227 


228 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


The  chief  event  of  Ling-wang’s  reign  was  the  birth  in 
551  B.c.  of  the  great  sage  Confucius.  This  name  is  the 
Latinized  form  of  the  Chinese  designation  K’ung  Fu-tz'i, 
the  “ Philosopher  K’ung.”  Confucius  sprang  from  a family 
that  had  served  in  various  states  as  officials  for  several 
generations.  K’ung  Kia,  his  great-great-great-grand- 
father, who  lived  at  the  end  of  the  eighth  century,  was  an 
equerry  to  the  Duke  of  Sung  and  perhaps  one  of  the  oldest 
known  members  of  the  family,  although  the  time-honored 
custom  of  inventing  pedigrees  for  distinguished  personages 
has  not  spared  the  peaceful  house  of  the  sage,  whose  an- 
cestry has  by  some  of  his  admirers  been  traced  to  the  times 
of  Wu-wang,  the  head  of  the  Chou  dynasty,  and  even  back 
to  those  of  the  Emperor  Huang-ti.  Some  of  the  genealogists 
of  his  family  trace  its  origin  to  some  dukes  of  the  state  of 
Sung.  Whichever  of  the  several  accounts  may  be  correct, 
this  much  is  certain;  namely,  that  the  K’ungs  of  which 
Confucius  was  a member  represent  probably  the  oldest 
nobility  of  which  any  family  in  this  world  can  boast,  the 
dukes  of  K’ung,  now  living  in  K’ii-fou  in  the  west  of  Shan- 
tung province,  being  able  to  trace  their  pedigree  back  by 
some  seventy  odd  generations  and  possibly  a good  deal 
more,  if  the  pre-Confucian  part  of  the  family  tradition  be 
correct.  The  present  duke  in  Shan-tung  is  merely  the 
head  of  a family,  the  male  members  of  which  some  two 
hundred  years  ago  already  numbered  eleven  thousand 
individuals,  — not  merely  dukes  and  princes,  but  the 
majority  of  them  in  the  lower  walks  of  life,  such  as  field 
laborers  and  wheel-barrow  men.  The  history  of  the  K’ung 
family  is  full  of  romance.  Legge  says : ‘ — 


> The  Chinese  Classics,  vol.  i,  Prolegomena,  p.  57  seq. 


THE  AGE  OF  LAU-TZI  AND  CONFUCIUS  229 


“K’ung  Kia  was  an  officer  of  well-known  loyalty  and  probity. 
Unfortunately  for  himself,  he  had  a wife  of  surpassing  beauty,  of 
whom  the  chief  minister  of  the  state,  by  name  Hua  Tu,  happened 
on  one  occasion  to  get  a glimpse.  Determined  to  possess  her,  he 
commenced  a series  of  intrigues,  which  ended  in  709  [710]  b.c.  in 
the  murder  of  Kia  and  the  reigning  Duke  Shang  [of  Sung].  At 
the  same  time,  Tu  secured  the  person  of  the  lady,  and  hastened  to 
his  palace  with  the  prize,  but  on  the  way  she  strangled  herself 
with  her  girdle. 

“An  enmity  was  thus  commenced  between  the  two  families 
of  K'ung  and  Hua  which  the  lapse  of  time  did  not  obliterate,  and 
the  latter  being  the  more  powerful  of  the  two,  Kia’s  great-grandson 
withdrew  into  the  State  of  Lu  to  avoid  their  persecution.  There 
he  waB  appointed  commandant  of  the  city  of  Fang,  and  is  known  in 
history  by  the  name  of  Fang-shu.  Fang-shu  gave  birth  to  Pi-hia, 
and  from  him  came  Shu-liang  Ho,  the  father  of  Confucius.  Ho 
appears  in  the  history  of  the  times  as  a soldier  of  great  prowess 
and  daring  bravery.  In  the  year  562  [563]  b.c.,  when  serving  at 
the  siege  of  a place  called  Pi-yang,  a party  of  the  assailants  made 
their  way  in  at  a gate  which  had  purposely  been  left  open,  and  no 
sooner  were  they  inside  than  the  portcullis  was  dropped.  Ho  was 
just  entering,  and  catching  the  massive  structure  with  both  his 
hands,  he  gradually  by  dint  of  main  strength  raised  it  and  held  it 
up  till  his  friends  had  made  their  escape.” 

When  Confucius  was  born  his  father  was  seventy  years 
of  age.  His  legal  first  wife  had  nine  daughters,  but  no  son ; 
and  since  the  only  son  born  to  him  by  a concubine  was  a 
cripple,  the  old  man  married  a second  wife,  whose  maiden 
name  was  Yen.  She  gave  birth  to  Confucius,  whose  exact 
birthday  and  even  birth  year  are  matters  in  dispute.  At 
his  birth  he  received  the  personal  name  K’iu,  and  his 
literary  name  was  Chung-ni.  His  exact  birthplace,  like 
that  of  Homer,  is  also  in  dispute.  But  the  two  places 
mentioned  in  connection  with  his  nativity  were  in  close 
proximity  to  each  other,  somewhere  within  the  limits  of 


230 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


the  present  prefecture  of  Yen-chou-fu  in  Shan-tung. 
Confucius  lost  his  father  at  the  age  of  three.  Among  the 
notices  of  his  early  life  Legge  mentions  that  as  a boy  he  used 
to  play  at  the  arrangement  of  sacrificial  vessels  and  at 
postures  of  ceremony.  This  is  extremely  characteristic, 
even  if  it  be  an  invention.  The  daily  life  of  the  Chinese 
gentleman,  which  had  for  centuries,  as  we  must  conclude 
from  that  minute  social  and  governmental  code,  the  Ch6u-li, 
been  forced  into  the  strait-jacket  of  etiquette,  was  the 
main  subject  of  Confucian  philosophy.  Every  situation 
in  life  had  its  prescribed  form;  and  the  anecdote  told  of 
Confucius  the  boy  seems  to  be  in  full  harmony  with  what 
we  know  of  the  man.  At  the  age  of  fifteen  he  began  to 
study  art.  He  married  at  the  age  of  nineteen  and  had  a 
son  whom  he  called  Li,  i.e.  “ the  Carp,”  and  whom  he  after- 
ward styled  Po-yu,  i.e.  “the  First  Fish,”  probably  anticipat- 
ing that  others  would  follow;  but  in  this  hope  he  was  dis- 
appointed, though  he  had  a daughter.  He  called  his  boy 
“carp,”  because  his  monarch,  Duke  Chau  of  Lu,  had  pre- 
sented him  with  a couple  of  carp  on  the  birth  of  his  child, 
which  shows  that  the  rising  scholar  was  well  connected  at 
that  early  age.  Soon  after  he  received  his  first  appoint- 
ments in  the  public  service,  unimportant  offices  in  Lu’s 
administration.  His  official  work  was,  however,  far  from 
taxing  his  talent.  All  he  had  to  do  was  to  make  no  mis- 
take in  his  calculations,  and  to  see  that  the  oxen  and  sheep 
on  the  public  fields  were  fat  and  strong.  WTien  twenty 
years  old  he  became  a public  teacher,  professing  to  expound 
the  doctrines  of  antiquity.  It  was  in  this  pursuit  that  he 
laid  the  foundation  of  his  wisdom.  In  his  twenty-third 
year  he  lost  his  mother,  and  much  has  been  written  about 
the  manner  in  which  he  buried  her  and  mourned  for  her. 


THE  AGE  OF  LAU-TZ'i  AND  CONFUCIUS  231 


During  the  succeeding  years  he  devoted  himself  to  teach- 
ing, and  soon  found  himself  surrounded  by  a number  of 
disciples  anxious  to  study  the  rules  of  propriety  as  handed 
down  in  the  old  historical  records. 

In  recapitulating  the  sage’s  early  career,  regarding  which 
comparatively  little  reliable  information  is  on  record,  we 
have  run  ahead  of  our  chronological  account  of  the  Chou 
emperors;  and,  having  arrived  at  the  reign  of  Ling-wang, 
we  have  also  left  behind  probably  the  most  important  per- 
sonage of  the  period,  the  philosopher  Lau-tzi,  this  being 
among  a number  of  other  names  the  designation  under 
which  he  is  best  known  in  China  as  well  as  abroad.  We  have 
to  distinguish  between  the  historical  Lau-tzi  and  the 
legendary  creation  which  sprang  from  him.  As  a man  he 
is  supposed  to  have  been  born  in  604  b.c.,  his  real  name 
being  Li  Ir.  Lau-tzi,  literally,  “the  Old  Philosopher,” 
which  gives  perfectly  good  sense  and  seems  to  render  other 
explanations  superfluous,  is  said  by  some  of  his  commenta- 
tors to  have  received  his  name  from  his  old  appearance  at 
birth;  and  in  this  sense  the  name  may  be  translated  by 
“the  old  child.”  Another  view  is  that  in  old  age  he  looked 
like  a boy.  According  to  Ssi-ma  Ts’ien’s  very  short  ac- 
count of  Lau-tzi’s  life,  he  was  a native  of  the  state  of  Ch’u, 
which  makes  it  doubtful  whether  purely  Chinese  blood  ran 
in  his  veins.  We  learn  nothing  about  his  early  life,  but 
the  historian  states  that  he  lived  in  the  capital  of  the  Chou 
imperial  dominion  as  keeper  of  the  archives.  If  we  take 
into  account  Confucius’s  main  study,  which  was  based  on 
research  in  old  historical  records  and  which  resulted  in  the 
compilation  of  the  “Spring  and  Autumn  Annals, ’’there  were 
certain  points  of  contact  between  the  two  great  philosophers 
at  least  in  their  daily  occupations;  and  yet  one  could  not 


232 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


imagine  any  greater  contrast  than  that  which  exists  in  the 
life-work  of  these  two  great  men,  who  have  become  the 
representative  types  of  the  development  of  Chinese  spiritual 
life.  Lau-tzi  must  have  been  a very  old  man  when  Con- 
fucius, then  a comparative  junior,  expressed  the  wish  to 
one  of  his  well-connected  disciples  to  visit  the  imperial 
court  in  order  to  meet  the  aged  philosopher  and  to  learn 
his  views  on  ceremonies  and  music.  His  ducal  patron 
liberally  placed  a carriage  and  a pair  of  horses  at  Confucius’s 
disposal  for  the  expedition.  If  Lau-tzi  was  really  in  charge 
of  the  Chou  archives,  it  was  possibly  he  who  placed  on 
record  the  court  annals  of  Ling-wang  and  those  of  his  suc- 
cessor and  son  King-wang. 

, §50.  King® -WANG  (544-520  b.c.) 

During  the  reign  of  this  emperor  the  eastern  neighbor 
of  the  imperial  domain,  the  state  of  Chong,  which,  owing 
to  its  central  position,  had  to  suffer  a good  deal  from  the 
jealousy  of  Tsin  in  the  north  and  Ch’u  in  the  south,  had 
the  good  fortune  to  be  governed  by  a prudent  minister, 
Kung-sun  Tzi-ch’an,  a great  friend  of  Confucius,  who  said 
of  him  that  he  had  four  of  the  characteristics  of  the  superior 
man ; in  his  conduct  he  was  humble ; in  serving  his  superiors 
he  was  respectful;  in  nourishing  the  people  he  was  kind; 
and  in  ordering  the  people  he  was  just.  He  added  that  he 
looked  upon  him  as  the  foundation  of  the  state.  Tzi-ch’an’s 
government  was  distinguished  by  its  liberality  and  his 
personal  kindness  to  the  people.  Mencius  ‘ relates  that  the 
minister  would  convey  people  in  his  own  carriage  across 
some  shallow  rivers  from  sheer  kind-heartedness;  but  he 
* Legge,  p.  193. 


THE  AGE  OF  LAU-TZI  AND  CONFUCIUS  233 

blamed  Tzi-ch’an  for  so  doing,  saying  that  although  the 
action  was  kind,  it  showed  that  he  did  not  understand  the 
practice  of  government.  Having  commented  on  the  im- 
practicability of  what  Tzi-ch’an  considered  kindness  shown 
to  the  people,  Mencius  added  that  if  a governor  should  try 
to  please  everybody,  he  would  find  the  days  insufficient  for 
his  work.  Tzi-ch’an  introduced  a penal  code  and  brought 
order  into  his  state  in  troubled  times.  His  leading  prin- 
ciple in  government  was  generosity  to  the  people,  and  con- 
sequently, severity  to  offenders,  this  being  the  best  way  to 
show  his  love  for  his  subjects.  “He  stands  out  in  history 
as  one  of  the  very  few  men  in  authority  during  those  dark 
times  who  were  able  and  pure,  true  to  their  chief  and 
generous  to  their  people.”  ‘ Tzi-ch’an  died  522  b.c. 


§51.  King^-wang  (519-476  b.c.) 

This  was  a son  of  the  former  King-wang,  whose  throne 
name  {King)  seems  identical  in  its  transliteration,  but  is 
really  written  with  a different  character  and  pronounced 
in  a different  tone.  On  his  accession  there  was  dissension 
among  the  brother  princes,  three  of  whom  claimed  the 
throne,  and  the  emperor  had  to  live  for  some  time  outside 
his  capital  until  his  brother  Ch’au  had  fled  to  the  state  of 
Ch’u  (519  B.C.).  Under  this  reign  a feud,  lasting  through 
many  years,  arose  between  the  two  states  of  Wu  and  Yii^. 
The  ruler  of  the  state  of  Wu  had  usurped  the  kingship  under 
the  title  of  Ho-lu-wang.  He  reigned  from  514  to  496  b.c., 
and  removed  his  capital  to  the  site  of  the  present  city  of 
Soochow.  Ho-lu  died  from  a wound  received  in  battle, 

' Watters,  A Guide  to  the  Tablets  in  a Temple  of  Confucius,  Shang- 
hai, 1879,  p.  36. 


234 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


and  his  son  Fu-ch’ai,  after  several  defeats,  was  successful 
against  the  state  of  Yiie,  whose  king,  Kou-tsien,  had  reigned 
from  496  to  466  b.c.  King  Ho-lu  of  Wu  had  in  his  service 
a famous  general,  Sun  Wu,  whose  name  has  been  perpetuated 
as  Sun-tzi,  i.e.  the  Philosopher  Sun.”  Under  this  name 
a little  work  on  military  tactics  is  ascribed  to  his  authorship ; 
and  since  it  is  mentioned  in  the  Shi-ki,  it  is  probably  the 
oldest  work  of  its  kind.  The  philosophy  of  war  is  its  sub- 
ject; and  among  the  qualifications  for  military  leadership 
there  is,  according  to  the  author,  none  more  essential  than 
the  maintenance  of  the  severest  discipline.  According  to 
an  oft-repeated  legend.  King  Ho-lu  had  asked  him  to  organ- 
ize a corps  of  one  hundred  and  eighty  Amazons  selected  from 
the  royal  harem,  but  at  their  first  roll-call  the  young  women 
made  light  of  the  idea  and  burst  out  laughing.  The  corps, 
however,  became  desperately  serious  and  actually  grew  into 
a useful  body  after  Sun-tzi  had  decapitated  two  of  the 
king’s  favorites  for  insubordination. 

The  wars  that  had  arisen  between  the  two  states  of 
Wu  and  Yiie  lasted  throughout  the  reign  of  King^-wang 
and  only  terminated  on  the  absorption  of  the  state  of  Wu 
by  that  of  Yiie  (473  b.c.).  A special  work,  the  Wu-yiie- 
ch'un-ts’iu  (“Spring  and  Autumn  Annals  of  the  States 
of  Wu  and  Yiie”),  in  ten  books,  originating  from  the 
Han  dynasty,  is  devoted  to  the  history  of  these  states. 
Another  work,  dating  from  the  later  Plan  dynasty  (since 
the  year  52  is  mentioned  in  the  body  of  the  book), 
the  Yiie-tsue-shu,  deals  with  the  antiquities  of  Yiie.  It  has 
probably  been  recast  from  a contemporaneous  record,  since 
the  work  is  primarily  ascribed  to  Tzi-kung,  one  of  the 
favorite  disciples  of  Confucius.  From  an  account  contained 
in  chapter  xi  of  this  work  it  appears  that  the  period  of 


THE  AGE  OF  LAU-TZI  AND  CONFUCIUS  235 


King  Kou-tsien  of  Yiie  coincided  with  that  in  which  the 
superiority  of  iron  swords  over  the  time-honored  bronze 
arms  was  seriously  discussed.  We  have  seen  that  the 
philosopher  Kuan-tzi  had  advised  the  Duke  of  Ts’i  to 
introduce  a tax  upon  the  iron  industry,  which  henceforth 
became  one  of  the  chief  sources  of  wealth  and  power  to 
Huan-kung.  Kuan-tzi,  in  his  discourse,  mentions  agri- 
cultural and  domestic  implements  and  “women’s  knives 
and  needles”  as  being  made  of  iron;  in  spite  of  his  anxiety 
to  quote  high  figures  for  the  consumption  of  iron,  he  does  not 
say  a word  about  arms.  It  appears  from  this  that  in  his  time 
(seventh  century)  iron  was  used  for  the  implements  of  peace, 
but  not  for  weapons  of  war,  which  would  require  sharper 
edges  and  finer  points  than  could  be  produced  during  that 
early  stage  of  iron  manufacture.  Three  hundred  years  later 
we  find  King  Kou-tsien  in  the  possession  of  certain  magic 
swords,  with  which  feats  of  wonder  could  be  performed. 
It  is  distinctly  stated  that  these  were  cast  from  tin  and 
copper.  But  it  is  stated  that  the  production  of  iron  swords, 
alleged  to  possess  magic  qualities,  excited  the  curiosity 
of  the  king  of  Ch’u,  who  consulted  an  expert  named 
Fong-hu-tzi  about  them.  It  seemed  an  entirely  new  thing 
then  that  iron,  in  the  form  of  swords,  possessed  virtues 
hitherto  ascribed  to  bronze  alone;  and  this  may  possibly 
be  due  to  some  improvement  in  the  manufacture,  such  as 
the  chilling  of  iron  into  steel,  which  may  not  have  been 
tried  until  after  the  lapse  of  generations  following  the  intro- 
duction of  the  ruder  implements  (ploughshares,  hatchets, 
and  other  articles  of  merely  domestic  use).  \Wien  the  king 
asked,  “ How  is  it  possible  that  swords  made  of  nothing  but 
iron  can  be  of  such  magic  subtleness?”  Fong-hu-tzi 
answered  in  terms  which  seem  to  suggest  that  he  was  fully 


236 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


conscious  of  the  extent  and  sequence  of  cultural  periods 
in  high  antiquity,  knowledge  of  which,  as  the  result  of 
scientific  reasoning,  is  a comparatively  recent  acquisition 
with  Westerners.  Fong-hu-tzi  places  his  "Stone  age”  in 
the  time  of  the  primeval  emperors  Hien-yiian  (about 
3000  B.C.),  Shon-nung  (2737-2705  b.c.),  and  Ho-sii  (an 
emperor  supposed  to  have  lived  before  the  first-named). 
In  this  period  weapons  (ping)  were  made  of  stone  and  were 
used  for  splitting  wooden  blocks  for  the  construction  of 
dwellings.  Tlie  dead  were  buried  by  dragons.  This  first 
period  is  followed  by  a second  age,  extending  from  Huang-ti 
(about  2700  b.c.)  down  to  Yii  (about  2200,  or  say,  2000  b.c., 
by  the  annals  of  the  Bamboo  Books),  in  which  jade  was 
used  for  similar  purposes.  This  may  be  compared  to  our 
neolithic  period,  when  hatchets  and  arrow-heads  were 
made  of  polished  stone,  either  jade  or  flint.  The  next 
period,  the  Bronze  age,  extends  from  Yii  down  to  the  time 
when  the  above-mentioned  conversation  of  the  king  of 
Ch’u  with  his  sword  expert  took  place,  i.e.  from  the  twenty- 
second  or  twentieth  century  down  to  about  500  b.c.,  when 
the  Iron  age,  as  far  as  arms  (swords)  are  concerned,  began. 
Such  a cultural  change,  as  the  replacement  of  bronze  by 
iron  or  steel,  in  the  manufacture  of  arms  could  not,  of  course, 
have  taken  place  all  at  once.  But  the  year  500  b.c.  seems 
a reasonable  date  to  assign  to  it,  if  we  allow  for  the  sporadic 
occurrence  of  iron  swords,  recorded  as  having  been  pre- 
sented as  tribute  from  abroad,  and  if  it  be  borne  in  mind 
that  in  certain  parts  of  China  iron  ore  was  produced,  whereas 
in  others  it  remained  unknown  for  centuries.  Those  few 
words  placed  on  record  in  the  Yiie-tsu&shu,  in  which  an 
expert  on  swords  places  his  views  before  the  inquiring  mind 
of  the  king  of  Ch’u,  the  head  of  the  southern  barbarians. 


THE  AGE  OF  LAU-TZI  AND  CONFUCIUS  237 


seem  to  give  us  a more  correct  idea,  limited  though  it  be, 
of  the  real  development  of  Chinese  history  than  the  gush- 
ing accounts  of  Confucian  literature,  in  which  many  of  the 
results  of  a much  more  recent  cultural  development  have 
been  simply  transferred  to  periods  we  are  wont  to  call  pre- 
historical.  If  we  are  told  by  the  Chinese  that  Huang-ti, 
who  ought  to  have  lived  about  the  end  of  the  Stone  age, 
caused  the  first  sacrificial  bronze  vases  to  be  cast,  and  that 
Yii,  whom  Fong-hu-tzi  places  at  the  head  of  the  Bronze 
age,  received  iron  and  steel  as  tribute  from  one  of  his 
provinces,*  this  would  be  an  anachronism  according  to  our 
philosopher  and  seems  to  support  the  skeptical  point  of 
view  which  forces  us  to  read  the  entire  early  history  of  the 
Chinese  with  great  caution.* 

We  have  now  to  return  to  the  most  important  two  per- 
sonages of  the  previous  two  generations,  the  philosophers 
Lau-tzi  and  Confucius.  These  are  the  names  representing 
the  two  really  indigenous  religions  of  China  — if  “religion” 
be  not  a gross  misnomer,  which  should  perhaps  be  replaced 
by  some  such  term  as  doctrine.  The  philosophies  of 
Lau-tzi  and  of  Confucius  — if  again  “philosophy”  be  not 
a misnomer  — have,  however,  though  often  misapplied  and 
misunderstood,  become  the  starting-point  for  those  cultural 
phases  which  may  be  called  religion,  inasmuch  as  they  are 
connected  with  worship  and  are  represented  by  temples 
and  priests.  Since  Buddhism  was  added  to  Lau-tzi’s  doc- 
trine of  the  Tau,  i.e.  “the  Right  Way,”  and  Confucius’s 
teachings  on  the  duties  of  the  Superior  Man,  the  Chinese 
speak  of  san-kiau,  i.e.  “the  Three  Teachings,”  or  “Reli- 
gions,” if  we  admit  the  parallel  by  which  Christianity  was 

* Shu-king,  ed.  Legge,  p.  121.  * Cf.  Hirth,  Chinesische  Ansichten 
iiber  Bronzetrommeln,  p.  18  seqq. 


238 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


called  king-kiau,  the  “Luminous  Religion,”  when  first 
brought  to  China  by  the  Nestorians  (636  a.d.)  or  t’ien-chu- 
kiau,  “the  Religion  of  the  Lord  of  Heaven,”  the  modern 
term  for  Roman  Catholicism,  or  Ye-su-kiau,  “the  Religion 
of  Jesus,”  under  which  designation  the  Protestant  denomi- 
nations used  to  be  comprised. ‘ One  of  these  so-called 
religions  is  Tauism,  supposed  to  be  based  in  the  last  in- 
stance on  a text  called  the  Tau-to-king,  “The  Canon,  or 
Classic,  of  the  Way  and  of  Virtue,”  the  authorship  of  which 
is  usually  ascribed  to  Lau-tzi.  It  seems,  however,  very 
doubtful  whether  the  work  in  its  present  shape  is  really 
identical  with  that  written  by  the  philosopher  himself,  if 
indeed  he  wrote  a work  at  all  and  if  he  did  not  play  a role 
similar  to  that  of  Socrates,  whose  teachings  were  placed  on 
record  by  others.  Some  of  its  critics,  however,  among  them 
Legge,  look  upon  it  as  the  more  or  less  genuine  record  of  the 
great  philosopher’s  views.  Others,  guided  by  Professor 
H.  A.  Giles  ^ take  an  entirely  skeptical  view,  and  regard 
the  Tau-to-king  as  a forgery.  Confucius  and  his  adherents, 
the  oldest  sources  for  what  we  know  about  the  history  of 
the  Chou  dynasty,  have  nothing  to  say  about  either  Lau- 
tzi  or  his  work ; but  this  is  possibly  the  result  of  a certain 
antagonism  between  the  two  schools.  For,  as  I have  already 
remarked,  no  greater  contrast  can  be  imagined  than  that 
between  the  teachings  of  Confucius  and  those  of  Lau-tzi. 
The  latter  would  be  unknown  but  for  the  fragments  handed 
down  in  the  works  of  his  later  adherents  where  he  is  often 
quoted  as  “ Lau-tzi  says,”  and  from  the  Tau-to-king,  which 
may  be  entirely  spurious,  or,  on  the  other  hand,  may  con- 
tain remnants  of  his  actual  sayings.  With  the  material 

* Since  the  last  few  years  changed  to  Ki-tu-kiau,i.e.  “Christ’s  Reli- 
gion.’’ * The  Remains  of  Lao-tzU,  in  China  Review,  vol.  xiv. 


THE  AGE  OF  LAU-TZI  AND  CONFUCIUS  239 


now  before  us  it  is  difficult,  if  not  impossible,  to  reconstruct 
what  Lau-tzi  really  said.  His  philosophy,  if  in  the  face  of 
such  insufficiency  in  its  tradition  we  can  use  this  term, 
impresses  one  as  transcendental,  when  compared  with 
Confucius’s  applied  moral  philosophy.  Like  Johann  Jacob 
Engel,  the  instructor  of  King  Frederick  William  III  of 
Prussia,  Confucius  was  a ''philosopher  for  the  world”  — 
the  world  in  a much  narrower  sense  than  that  of  Lau-tzi, 
the  Chinese  world  as  it  had  grown  out  of  its  own  history. 
The  kun-tzi,  the  "superior  man,”  or  the  "true  gentleman 
in  all  positions  of  life,”  as  we  may  call  him,  is  one  of  the 
chief  objects  of  Confucius’s  teachings,  which  are  devoted 
to  practical  life  and  its  requirements;  whereas  Lau-tzi’s 
work,  as  we  may  conclude  from  the  disconnected  fragments 
in  which  it  is  presented  to  us,  must  have  been  full  of  mystic 
abstractions.  These,  I feel  bound  to  confess,  I do  not 
understand;  but  for  this  I do  not  blame  Lau-tzi.  If  in- 
sufficient training  in  philosophical  thought  must  be  accepted 
as  an  excuse  for  not  understanding  the  works  of  so  many 
of  our  own  contemporaries,  written  in  our  own  language, 
what  shall  we  say  about  the  Tau-td-king  and  the  fragments 
of  Lau-tzi’s  sayings  preserved  in  later  mystics,  the  ele- 
mentary terms  of  which,  such  as  tau  ("The  Way,”  or 
"The  Word,”  possibly  with  a double-entendre  like  the 
Greek  \6jo<;)  or  wu-wel  ("non-action”),  have  been  trans- 
lated by  as  many  different  terms  as  there  were  commen- 
tators ? 

Unfortunately  the  translation  of  a Chinese  philosophical 
work,  even  if  handed  down  to  posterity  without  adultera- 
tion of  any  kind,  is  fraught  with  difficulties  fully  as  great 
as  the  rendering  of  Chinese  poetry.  The  latter  requires  a 
man  to  be  not  only  an  exact  philologist,  but  also  a poet; 


240 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


and  these  two  will  quarrel  on  every  concession  they  have 
to  make  to  each  other.  The  translation  of  a work  like 
Lau-tzi’s  Tau-td-Jcing  suffers  under  a similar  difficulty. 
The  philosopher  should  not  think  he  understands  unless  he 
has  heard  what  the  philologist  has  to  say ; and  the  philolo- 
gist should  neither  condemn  nor  indorse  without  entering 
heart  and  soul  into  the  subject.  Extensive  though  the 
literature,  both  native  and  foreign,  on  Lau-tzi  and  his 
philosophy  is,  as  well  from  the  skeptical  as  from  the  re- 
ceptive point  of  view,  it  seems  too  early  to  arrive  at  a final 
conclusion  as  to  the  authenticity  of  any  or  all  of  his  sayings 
now  on  record.  Further,  assuming  the  genuineness  of  the 
fragments  that  have  come  down  to  us,  it  would  be  difficult 
to  reconstruct  from  them  the  sage’s  philosophical  system. 

The  story  of  Confucius’s  visit  to  Lau-tzi,  as  told  by  Ssi-ma 
Ts’ien,  may  be  merely  hen  trovato;  but  it  seems  quite 
characteristic  of  the  two  men,  of  whom  Lau-tzi  must  have 
been  the  more  genuine  sage.  True  to  the  principle  of  non- 
action, he  had  discarded  all  ambition  in  life  when  he  found 
himself  interviewed  by  the  rising  young  philosopher  anxious 
to  search  the  records  of  past  generations,  from  which 
he  wished  to  derive  the  principles  by  which  to  reform 
the  life  of  his  nation.  Lau-tzi  is  said  to  have  given  Con- 
fucius the  following  reply;  “The  men  of  the  times  you 
refer  to  have  rotted  in  their  graves  and  live  only  in  their 
words.  The  superior  man  must  fall  in  with  his  time  in 
order  to  make  his  way;  otherwise  he  will  be  surrounded 
by  difficulties.  I have  heard  that  a prudent  merchant 
will  keep  his  valuables  concealed  in  the  depths  of  his  store- 
houses as  though  he  had  none  to  show ; similarly  the  supe- 
rior man  may  be  full  of  merit  and  yet  his  appearance  may 
be  plain  and  simple.  Discard  withal  haughtiness  and 


THE  AGE  OF  LAU-TZI  AND  CONFUCIUS  241 


those  many  desires,  with  outward  appearances  and  licen- 
tious schemes.  These  are  all  of  no  advantage  to  you. 
That  is  all  I can  tell  you.”  The  rebuff  involved  in  these 
few  words  seems  to  speak  volumes  as  to  the  character  of 
the  two  sages. 

Lau-tzi  certainly  appears  as  the  real  philosopher  of  the 
two,  whose  views  of  the  world  had  ripened  after  a life  spent 
in  deep  thought ; spernere  mundum  and  spernere  se  sperni 
seem  to  have  been  the  leading  notes  of  his  personal 
character.  Confucius  was  the  very  reverse.  He  took  the 
greatest  interest  in  this  world,  its  men  (himself  included) 
and  their  lives.  To  reform  the  social  life  of  his  native  land, 
to  lead  his  contemporaries  to  adopt  a certain  standard  of 
morality  as  exhibited  in  their  daily  doings,  was  the  main 
ambition  of  his  work.  This  standard  he  endeavored  to 
derive  from  the  records  of  the  past.  What  he  taught  the 
Chinese  world  of  his  time  was  not  so  much  the  creation  of 
his  own  philosophical  mind  as  the  result  of  his  historical 
studies.  That  characteristic  of  Chinese  social  life,  the 
burying  of  man’s  individual  life  among  a rigid  mass  of 
ceremonies,  can  be  traced  to  the  very  beginnings  of  Chinese 
history.  Confucius  was  merely  the  son  of  his  time;  and 
his  time  was  bent  on  ceremonies  and  had  been  so  for  cen- 
turies, as  the  early  history  of  the  Chou  dynasty,  with  its 
great  code  of  government  and  social  life,  the  Ch6u-li,  clearly 
shows.  He  merely  placed  on  record  what  had  existed  for 
ages  and  gave  it  his  own  interpretation,  both  by  his  teach- 
ings and  his  personal  life.  In  this  respect  he  has  probably 
had  greater  influence  on  the  life  of  his  nation  than  any 
philosopher  of  the  Western  world  on  that  of  his  own  race. 
In  spite  of  many  political  changes  during  thousands  of  years 
there  has  always  been  a China  from  beginning  to  end,  from 


242 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OP  CHINA 


the  dawn  of  history  to  the  present  day.  This  much  cannot 
be  said  of  any  of  the  other  great  empires  of  the  world,  since 
none  of  these  has  attained  to  any  such  longevity,  not  even 
excepting  Egypt,  which  name  covers  a variety  of  races, 
each  with  a history  of  its  own.  This  stability  in  the  life 
of  the  nation  is  greatly  due  to  the  principles  inherent  in 
the  nation  itself,  but  codified,  as  it  were,  by  the  great  sage. 
If  we  affix  to  these  principles  the  label  “Confucianism,” 
we  should  not  forget  that  as  regards  their  main  character- 
istics their  creator  has  merely  voiced  views  held  long  before 
him,  and  that  the  life  of  the  nation,  as  far  back  as  history 
goes,  may  in  a certain  sense  be  looked  upon  as  “ retrospective 
Confucianism.”  Certainly  Confucius  would  not  have  been 
what  he  was  without  that  preparatory  period.  This,  how- 
ever, does  not  detract  from  his  merits  as  a maker  of  his 
people,  whose  dependence  on  him  has  been  well  expressed 
by  Von  der  Gabelentz  in  his  excellent  lecture  on  Confucius 
and  his  teachings.  ‘ 

That  writer  says : — 

“ Quite  unique  is  the  position  occupied  by  him,  who,  as  no  other 
man,  was  a teacher  of  his  people,  who,  I venture  to  say,  has  become 
and  continued  to  be  a ruler  of  his  people,  the  Sage  of  the  family 
K’ung  in  the  State  of  Lu,  whom  we  know  by  the  name  of  Confucius. 
Unique  is  his  position  not  only  in  the  history  of  philosophy,  but 
also  in  the  history  of  mankind.  For  there  is  hardly  any  other  man 
who,  like  Confucius,  incorporated  in  his  own  person  all  the  constit- 
uent elements  of  the  Chinese  type  and  all  that  is  eternal  in  his 
people’s  being.  If  we  are  to  measure  the  greatness  of  a historic 
personage,  I can  see  only  one  standard  applicable  for  the  purpose : 
the  effectiveness  of  that  person’s  influence  according  to  its  dimen- 
sions, duration,  and  intensity.  If  this  standard  be  applied,  Con- 

* Confucius  und  seine  Lehre,  Leipzig  (F.  A.  Brockhaus),  p.  4 seq., 
and  the  English  version  in  the  China  Review,  vol.  xvu,  p.  63. 


THE  AGE  OF  LAU-TZI  AND  CONFUCIUS  243 

fucius  was  one  of  the  greatest  of  men.  For  even  at  the  present 
day,  after  the  lapse  of  more  than  two  thousand  years,  the  moral, 
social,  and  political  life  of  about  one-third  of  mankind  continues 
to  be  imder  the  fuU  influence  of  his  mind.” 

Confucius’s  visit  to  the  capital  of  the  Chou  emperor  and 
his  interview  with  Lau-tzi  made  a deep  impression  upon 
him.  He  had  seen  the  splendor  of  the  imperial  court  and 
been  impressed  with  reminiscences  of  the  great  history  of 
the  empire  in  the  shape  of  wall  paintings  of  the  old  rulers 
Yau  and  Shun,  with  their  successors,  but  especially  by  a 
representation  of  the  Duke  of  Chou,  with  his  ward,  the 
infant  emperor  Ch’bng,  giving  audience  to  the  princes  of 
the  empire.  A remark  attributed  to  him,  according  to 
which  he  refers  to  the  Duke  of  Chou  as  the  origin  of  imperial 
power  under  the  Chou  dynasty,  shows  in  what  veneration 
he  held  the  supposed  first  author  of  the  Ch6u-li.  After  a 
short  stay  in  the  capital  Confucius  returned  to  his  native 
country,  the  state  of  Lu,  and  there  his  fame  began  to  spread, 
the  followers  of  his  doctrines  being  counted  by  thou- 
sands. Lu  soon  became  disorganized  by  political  factions 
which  made  war  on  each  other;  and  matters  went  so  far 
as  to  cause  the  legitimate  ruler,  Duke  Chau,  in  517  b.c., 
to  take  refuge  in  the  neighboring  state  of  Ts’i,  which  a 
century  and  a half  earlier  had  been  brought  into  such  a 
flourishing  condition  by  its  famous  ruler,  Duke  Huan,  and 
his  prime  minister,  the  philosopher  Kuan-tzi.  In  order 
to  avoid  the  troubles  of  Lu,  Confucius  followed  his  duke. 
The  court  of  Duke  King,  the  ruler  of  Ts’i,  was  celebrated 
for  its  music.  The  impression  of  a certain  piece  which 
Confucius  heard  played  on  his  arrival  was  so  great  that  he 
refrained  from  meat  for  three  months.  Confucius’s  rela- 
tions with  Duke  King  became  pleasant,  and  led  to  an  ex- 


244 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


change  of  opinions  on  political  and  social  subjects,  but  they 
did  not  lead  to  the  appointment  of  the  sage  to  the  position 
he  probably  desired,  viz.  adviser-in-chief  to  the  duke,  the 
latter  having  been  warned  by  his  minister  against  the  con- 
ceited scholar  who,  in  his  opinion,  held  impracticable 
views,  set  such  high  value  on  funereal  ceremonies,  wasted 
property  on  burials,  and  had  a thousand  peculiarities  con- 
nected with  his  rules  of  propriety.  It  appears  from  this 
that  Confucius’s  social  system  was  not  received  with  open 
arms  by  some  of  the  common-sense  statesmen  of  the  time. 
Duke  King,  accordingly,  made  little  of  his  visitor’s  services, 
who,  after  a stay  of  about  two  years,  returned  disgusted 
to  his  native  state  of  Lu.  There  he  lived  the  life  of  a private 
scholar  down  to  the  year  501  b.c. 

At  this  time  all  was  in  disorder  in  Lu.  While  the  duke 
was  living  as  a refugee  in  Ts’i,  his  prominent  relatives 
fought  for  supremacy  in  the  government,  and  they  con- 
tinued to  do  so  till  his  death  in  509  b.c.,  when  he  was  suc- 
ceeded by  one  of  his  relatives  under  the  style  of  Duke 
Ting.  Even  then  fighting  did  not  cease  among  the  power- 
ful grandees  of  the  duchy.  Confucius  during  all  this  time 
kept  aloof  from  politics.  After  fifteen  years  spent  in  study 
and  literary  work,  he  was  appointed  magistrate  in  one  of 
the  cities  of  Lu,  where  he  put  his  social  theories  to  a prac- 
tical test.  The  people  of  Chung-tu,  the  district  over  which 
he  had  jurisdiction,  had  now  to  conform  to  his  rules  of 
propriety  with  all  that  pedantry  which,  even  to  this  day, 
governs  the  life  of  educated  Chinamen.  His  government 
was  one  of  interference  with  all  individual  liberty.  Every 
act  of  life  had  its  prescribed  ceremonial;  ceremonial  in 
every  detail,  such  as  we  are  wont  to  see  only  in  the  courts 
of  rulers  and  the  households  of  high  dignitaries,  became 


THE  AGE  OF  LAU-TZI  AND  CONFUCIUS  245 


obligatory  on  the  people  at  large ; and  all  matters  of  daily 
life  were  subject  to  some  rigid  rule.  Even  the  food  which 
the  different  classes  of  people  were  allowed  to  eat  was 
regulated ; males  and  females  were  kept  apart  from  each 
other  in  the  streets ; and  even  the  thickness  of  coffins  and 
the  shape  and  situation  of  graves  were  made  the  subjects 
of  his  regulations.  The  result  of  this  system  is  said  by  the 
admirers  of  the  sage  to  have  been  marvelous;  for  the  man- 
ners of  the  population  were  changed  entirely,  and  they 
became  patterns  of  good  behavior.  The  princes  of  neigh- 
boring states  wished  to  imitate  his  style  of  administration ; 
and  Duke  Ting  was  so  much  impressed  by  the  good  results 
of  Confucius’s  system  that  he  decided  to  bring  him  to  the 
front  and  appoint  him  to  some  higher  metropolitan  office. 
Thus  we  soon  see  him  in  the  position  of  minister  of  justice, 
the  effect  of  his  appointment  being  that  all  crime  dis- 
appeared in  the  state.  In  deciding  cases  he  would  take  the 
opinions  of  several  individuals  and,  after  due  consideration, 
decide  in  favor  of  one  of  them.  Once  he  made  light  of  a 
case  in  which  a father  had  brought  a serious  charge  against 
his  son.  When  questioned  how  this  judgment  was  com- 
patible with  his  views  on  filial  piety,  he  threw  the  guilt  on 
the  accuser  for  not  having  taught  his  son  to  be  filial. 

In  this  high  position  Confucius  was  not  without  political 
influence,  the  chief  object  of  which  was  the  strengthening 
of  the  duke’s  position  against  that  of  his  grandees.  It  is 
very  likely  that  many  of  the  stories  of  the  sage’s  life  are 
of  a legendary  character;  still  whatever  truth  may  be  at 
the  bottom  of  them  must  be  due  to  the  greatness  of  his 
personal  character.  Even  the  most  patient  population 
in  the  world  would  have  revolted  against  such  tyranny  of 
interference  as  he  imposed  upon  the  people  of  Chung-tu, 


246 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


had  he  not  impressed  his  contemporaries  as  the  embodi- 
ment of  absolute  morality  in  a world  full  of  vice  and  mis- 
conduct. 

To  Confucius’s  management  of  affairs  in  the  state  of  Lu 
was  ascribed  such  a rise  in  the  ruling  duke’s  political  power 
that  the  latter’s  neighbors,  especially  the  Duke  of  Ts’i, 
became  jealous  of  his  successful  government,  which  threat- 
ened to  raise  Lu  to  a certain  leadership  among  the  con- 
federate states.  An  old  trick  was  resorted  to  as  a means 
to  divert  Duke  Ting’s  interest  from  excellence  in  govern- 
ment to  things  of  a more  worldly  nature.  Eighty  beautiful 
girls  and  one  hundred  and  twenty  fine  horses  were  offered 
as  a gift  to  the  duke,  who  to  the  great  disgust  of  the  sage 
accepted  them.  From  this  time  onward  Confucius  lost 
his  influence  over  the  duke;  and  gradually,  though  with- 
out an  open  rupture,  he  again  withdrew  into  private  life. 
He  could  not  now  bear  to  live  in  his  home,  but  wandered 
about  for  fourteen  years  a voluntary  exile. 

He  first  went  with  some  of  his  disciples  to  the  state  of 
Wei.  Ling,  its  reigning  duke  (534-493  b.c.),  was  a dissi- 
pated character;  yet,  recognizing  the  great  reputation 
enjoyed  by  the  sage  throughout  China,  he  encouraged  the 
latter’s  stay  in  the  country  by  assigning  him  a revenue  of 
60,000  measures  of  grain.  Life  at  the  court  of  Wei,  how- 
ever, was  apparently  not  congenial  to  his  views,  one  of 
the  chief  characteristics  of  which  was  purity  in  morals. 
The  duke,  to  whose  court  Confucius  was  attached  as  an 
ornament  rather  than  as  a propagandist  of  his  views,  was 
married  to  a lady  of  evil  reputation,  named  Nan-tzi.  Being 
summoned  to  an  interview  with  her,  Confucius  unwillingly 
obeyed,  and  when  one  of  his  disciples  remonstrated  with 
him  for  having  been  seen  in  the  company  of  a woman  of 


THE  AGE  OF  LAU-TZI  AND  CONFUCIUS  247 


such  an  unfavorable  character,  he  swore  emphatically  that 
nothing  improper  had  occurred  between  them.  Some 
time  afterward,  the  duke,  as  an  act  of  grace,  invited  Con- 
fucius to  accompany  him  on  a ride  through  the  streets  in 
a cortege  in  which  the  duke  and  his  wicked  consort  occupied 
a carriage  followed  by  one  containing  the  sage,  when  the 
people  cried  out,  “Lo!  here  is  lust  in  front  and  virtue 
behind.”  The  idea  of  being  forced  to  associate  with  those 
who,  though  of  exalted  rank,  were  not  of  equal  virtue  with 
his  own,  was  incompatible  with  his  principles;  and  he, 
therefore,  decided  to  leave  the  country.  He  visited  several 
other  states,  but  did  not  succeed  in  obtaining  the  position 
he  desired,  — a position  of  high  trust  in  which  he  might 
have  an  opportunity  to  reform  society  and  government 
according  to  his  principles.  All  he  wanted  was  such  a 
position.  "If  any  one  would  make  use  of  me,”  he  says,* 
“twelve  months  would  suffice  to  score  results  in  teaching, 
and  in  three  years  all  would  be  completed.”  The  desired 
invitation  to  join  any  of  the  minor  rulers  in  the  cares  of 
government  was  not,  however,  forthcoming,  and  he  con- 
tinued to  wander  from  state  to  state.  He  seemed  to  have 
a chance  to  carry  out  his  ideals  when  he  visited  the  state 
of  Ch’u,  mostly  inhabited  by  Man  barbarians,  whose  king 
was  inclined  to  endow  him  with  some  territory;  but  the 
monarch,  being  warned  by  his  prime  minister  that  a man 
like  Confucius,  surrounded  by  so  many  men  of  superior 
talent  calling  themselves  his  disciples,  would  soon  rise  to 
become  a political  power  and  a danger  to  his  government, 
abandoned  the  idea.  \Vhen  soon  afterward  the  king  died, 
Confucius  left  the  south  and  returned  to  Wei. 


* Confucian  Analects,  ed.  Legge,  p.  131. 


248  THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 

Great  changes  had  in  the  meantime  taken  place  in  Wei. 
Duke  Ling  had  died.  The  legitimate  heir,  his  son,  was 
forced  to  leave  the  country,  owing  to  a quarrel  with  his 
mother,  the  notorious  Nan-tzi;  and  the  government  fell  to 
Duke  Ling’s  grandson,  who  reigned  under  the  name  of  Ch’u. 
Ch’u  invited  Confucius  to  assist  him  in  the  government  of 
his  state,  but  the  sage  had  his  doubts  as  to  the  legitimacy 
of  the  succession  and  declined  the  honor.  He  continued 
to  live  in  Wei  for  about  five  years  in  a private  capacity. 

Through  the  influence  of  one  of  his  disciples,  who  held 
office  in  the  state  of  Lu,  Confucius,  now  sixty-eight  years 
old,  was  at  last  recalled  to  his  native  country.  There  he 
died  five  years  after  his  return,  in  479  b.c.  After  the 
many  disappointments  he  had  received,  it  seems  that  his 
ambition  had  lessened,  and  that  he  had  become  reconciled 
to  the  idea  of  living  the  quiet  life  of  a scholar  among  his 
compatriots,  highly  honored  indeed,  and  even  consulted, 
by  those  in  power,  but  not  wielding  the  power  himself. 
Several  of  the  literary  works  ascribed  to  Confucius  are  said 
to  have  originated  during  this  period  of  retirement.  He 
also  lost  his  son  Li,  “the  Carp,”  to  whom  he  was  not  half 
so  much  attached  as  to  certain  of  his  disciples.  Some  of 
the  latter,  also,  he  was  destined  to  outlive,  and  among  them 
none  was  more  attached  to  him  than  his  favorite  Tzi-lu. 
Legge  ‘ says  of  him : — 

“He  [Tzi-lu]  stands  out  a sort  of  Peter  in  the  Confucian  school, 
a man  of  impulse,  prompt  to  speak  and  prompt  to  act.  He  gets 
many  a check  from  the  master;  but  there  is  evidently  a strong 
sympathy  between  them.  Tzi-lu  uses  a freedom  with  him  on  which 
none  of  the  other  disciples  dares  to  venture,  and  there  is  not  one 
among  them  all  for  whom,  if  I may  speak  from  my  own  feeling, 
the  foreign  student  comes  to  form  such  a liking.” 

* The  Chinese  Classics,  vol.  i.  Prolegomena,  p.  87. 


THE  AGE  OF  LAU-TZI  AND  CONFUCIUS  249 


Tzi-lu,  whose  original  name  was  Chung  Yu,  was  of  poor 
descent  and  was  known  for  his  filial  piety.  Another 
disciple,  known  as  Tzi-yiian,  whose  name  was  Yen  Hui, 
was  remarkable  not  so  much  for  his  sayings  as  for  his  great 
devotion  to,  and  his  personal  friendship  with,  Confucius. 
He  was  thirty  years  younger  than  the  latter,  and  the  his- 
torian relates  of  him  that  at  the  age  of  twenty-nine  his 
hair  turned  white.  Confucius  had  to  mourn  the  death  of 
this  follower  also. 

Another  of  the  sage’s  pupils,  who  outlived  him  many 
years,  was  Tzi-yii,  properly  called  Tsong  Ts’an,  well  known 
throughout  China  as  a model  of  filial  piety.  In  the  legends 
current  about  him  he  is  represented  as  a regular  caricature 
in  his  exaggerations  of  this,  the  cardinal  domestic  virtue 
of  the  Chinaman.  The  idol  he  worshiped  beyond  any- 
thing else  was  his  mother ; once  he  refused  to  enter  a village 
simply  because  its  name,  Shong-mu,  meaning  “ better  than 
a mother,”  displeased  him,  and  he  divorced  his  wife  because 
she  had  served  his  mother  an  unsavory  dish.  In  other 
words,  his  virtue,  notwithstanding  the  great  admiration 
with  which  it  is  viewed  by  the  Chinese,  was,  like  that  of 
Confucius  himself,  sometimes  of  a pettifogging  and  pedantic 
character  and  devoid  of  all  humor.  The  well-known 
Hiau-king  (“Canon  of  Filial  Piety”)  is  ascribed  to  Tzi-3fii. 

One  of  the  best-known  followers  of  Confucius,  and  the 
one  to  whose  life  Ssi-ma  Ts’ien  devotes  particular  attention 
in  his  chapter  on  “Confucian  Disciples,”  was  Tzi'-kung, 
properly  called  Tuan-mu  Tz’i,  who,  like  Tzi-lu,  is  one  of 
the  chief  interlocutors  in  the  accounts  of  the  sage’s  personal 
life,  and  of  whose  judgment  Confucius  himself  had  the 
highest  opinion.  The  master  was  by  no  means  so  well 
satisfied  with  all  his  adherents,  and  he  made  no  secret  of 


250 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


his  displeasure  if  he  found  fault  with  them.  Such  was  the 
case  with  Tzi-o,  properly  called  Tsai  Yii,  a man  of  talent 
who  did  not  accept  Confucius’s  moral  standard,  as  may  be 
shown  from  a celebrated  passage  in  the  “Confucian 
Analects” : “Tsai  Yii  being  asleep  during  the  daytime,  the 
Master  said,  ‘Rotten  wood  cannot  be  carved;  a wall  of 
dirty  earth  will  not  receive  the  trowel.  Tliis  Yii — what  is 
the  use  of  my  reproving  him?’”  Thus  every  one  among 
the  better-known  disciples  had  his  personal  characteristics 
not  only  in  his  relation  to  the  master,  as  shown  in  numerous 
anecdotes  of  this  kind,  but  also  in  the  views  expressed  by 
him  in  conversation. 

There  can  be  no  doubt  that  Confucius  has  had  a greater 
influence  on  the  development  of  the  Chinese  national 
character  than  many  emperors  taken  together.  He  is, 
therefore,  one  of  the  essential  figures  to  be  considered  in 
connection  with  any  history  of  China.  That  he  could  in- 
fluence his  nation  to  such  a degree  was,  it  appears  to  me, 
due  more  to  the  peculiarity  of  the  nation  than  to  that  of  his 
own  personality.  Had  he  lived  in  any  other  part  of  the 
world,  his  name  would  perhaps  be  forgotten.  As  we  have 
seen,  he  had  formed  his  character  and  his  personal  views 
on  man’s  life  from  a careful  study  of  documents  closely 
connected  with  the  moral  philosophy  cultivated  by  former 
generations.  What  he  preached  to  his  contemporaries 
was,  therefore,  not  all  new  to  them ; but,  having  himself, 
in  the  study  of  old  records,  heard  the  dim  voice  of  the  sages 
of  the  past,  he  became,  as  it  were,  the  megaphone  phono- 
graph, through  which  were  expressed  to  the  nation  those 
views  which  he  had  derived  from  the  early  development 
of  the  nation  itself.  His  influence  may  be  considered  from 
a threefold  point  of  view;  for,  the  practical  lessons  he 


THE  AGE  OF  LAU-TZI  AND  CONFUCIUS  251 


taught  are  to  be  found  in  what  he  wrote,  in  what  he  said, 
and  in  what  he  did. 

What  Confucius  wrote  is  probably  confined  to  editorial 
work  rather  than  contained  in  independent  compositions. 
Tlie  so-called  “Chinese  Classics”  consist  of  two  series  of 
books,  the  first  of  which,  known  as  the  Wu-king,  “Five 
Canons,”  are  works  of  pre-Confucian  origin  and  were 
partly  edited  or  compiled  by  the  sage  himself,  whereas  the 
second,  the  Ssl-shu,  the  so-called  “Four  Books,”  consists 
of  texts  connected  with  Confucius’s  life  and  teachings, 
but  not  written  or  edited  by  him.  The  Wu-king  now  com- 
prises the  following  works ; — 

(1)  The  I-king,  “Canon  of  Changes,”  about  which  we 
have  had  occasion  to  speak  in  connection  with  Won-wang, 
father  of  Wu-wang,  the  founder  of  the  Chou  dynasty. 
Confucius  is  said  to  have  had  a high  opinion  of  this  work, 
though  it  seems  he  had  no  hand  in  the  compilation  of  its 
text  as  known  at  the  time. 

(2)  The  Shu-king,  “Canon  of  History,”  as  the  title  is 
sometimes  translated,  though  its  literal  rendering  indicates 
merely  a canonical  collection  of  writings  or  documents. 
We  have  had  occasion,  when  discussing  the  history  of  the 
most  ancient  emperors,  such  as  Yau,  Shun,  and  Yii,  to 
speak  of  this  book,  the  detailed  accounts  of  which  contain 
so  many  excellent  speeches,  extolling  the  virtue  of  the  great 
model  rulers,  in  contrast  with  certain  miserable  tyrants, 
and  yet  do  not  inspire  us  with  confidence  in  their  historical 
accuracy.  There  may  be  an  element  of  truth  in  some  of 
them;  but  it  would  seem  that  the  names  of  Yau,  Shun, 
and  Yii  were  merely  borrowed  for  the  purpose  of  expressing, 
as  those  of  high  antiquity  and  therefore  of  great  authority, 
views  which  in  reality  breathe  the  spirit  of  an  age  almost 


252 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


contemporaneous  with  Confucius  himself.  What  the  Shu- 
king  places  on  record  as  Chinese  history  of  the  third  millen- 
nium B.c.  is  much  too  interesting  to  deserve  credit;  and  I 
am  inclined  to  date  the  beginning  of  that  period,  the  record 
of  which  we  may  accept  with  a certain  amount  of  confidence 
when  it  becomes  dry  and  monotonous  under  the  Shang 
dynasty,  about  the  middle  of  the  second  millennium  b.c. 
It  does  not  seem  that  Confucius  himself  was  responsible 
for  this  fabrication.  He  may  have  merely  copied  or  com- 
piled what  he  found  of  the  old  emperor  lore  existing 
before  his  own  time;  but  if  this  work,  which  Professor 
Grube'  may  be  right  in  calling  a '‘poetical  production,”  has 
been  received  as  gospel  by  the  Chinese  down  to  the  present 
day,  Confucius  must  be  considered  as  the  one  great  au- 
thority that  perpetuated  the  error. 

(3)  The  Shi-king,  “ Canon  of  Odes,”  that  mine  of  informa- 
tion on  the  most  ancient  culture  of  the  Chinese,  containing 
over  three  hundred  odes  then  current  among  the  people, 
the  dates  of  some  of  w'hich  may  be  determined  from  his- 
torical facts  alluded  to  in  them  and  many  of  which  may 
have  been  sung  by  the  people  and  its  bards  centuries  before 
they  were  written  down.  The  work  was  probably  arranged 
and  edited  by  Confucius  himself. 

(4)  The  Li-ki,  “Canon  of  Rites,”  a collection  of  rules 
describing,  to  the  minutest  detail,  the  ceremonial  to  be 
observed  by  the  Chinese  gentleman  on  all  the  occasions  of 
daily  life.  These  rules,  which  may  be  called  the  very  soul 
of  Chinese  society,  probably  existed  long  before  Confucius. 
The  Li-ki  corresponds  in  spirit  to  the  Ch6u-li,  which  to  us 
is  of  much  greater  importance  as  a record  of  historical  value, 
though  it  is  not  now  included  among  the  canonical  books 

* Geschichte  der  chinesischen  Litteratur,  p.  41. 


THE  AGE  OF  LAU-TZI  AND  CONFUCIUS  253 


of  prime  importance.  The  Li-ki  may  be  called  the  cere- 
monial code  of  the  private  man,  whereas  the  Chou-li  is 
devoted  to  public  life  and  the  institutions  of  government. 

(5)  The  Ch’un-ts’iu,  “Spring  and  Autumn,”  annals  of 
the  state  of  Lu,  first  compiled  by  Confucius,  and  then 
largely  extended  by  commentaries,  which  constitute  its 
real  value,  chief  among  the  latter  being  the  Tso-chuan  by 
Tso  K’iu-ming. 

These  five  canons  were  probably  the  books  with  which 
Confucius  occupied  himself  at  various  periods  of  his  life. 
If  I do  not  hold  him,  or  any  philosopher  connected  with 
his  school,  responsible  for  the  contents  of  the  Shu-king,  it 
is  chiefly  on  the  ground  that  religious  views  are  expressed 
in  it  which  appear  to  be  foreign  to  the  Confucian  school. 
That  unmistakable  monotheism  cultivated  by  the  ancient 
emperors  must  have  been  clearly  discernible  in  those 
ancient  records  or  traditions  which  the  inventors  of  the 
old  emperor  lore,  whoever  they  may  have  been,  made  the 
starting-point  of  their  historical  accounts. 

What  Confucius  said,  his  views  on  life  and  his  practical 
philosophy,  has  been  deposited  mainly  in  the  works  known 
as  the  Ssi-shu,  “The  Four  Books.”  Although  their  con- 
tents are  inseparable  from  the  master’s  person  and  his  doc- 
trines, Confucius  had  nothing  to  do  with  their  compilation, 
which  must  be  ascribed  to  the  sage’s  disciples  and  adher- 
ents. Tlie  Ssi-shu  now  comprise  the  following  four  works, 
which  may  be  called  the  main  text-books  of  Confucianism : 

(1)  Lun-yii,  “Discourses,”  in  which  the  master’s  views 
are  embodied  in  dialogues  of  a desultory  kind  between 
himself  and  his  disciples.  Legge’s  translation  of  this 
title  by  “Confucian  Analects”  is  not,  of  course,  literal; 
but  it  seems  appropriate  as  being  descriptive  of  the  char- 


254 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


acter  of  the  work,  the  twenty  books  of  which  are  supposed 
to  have  originated  from  certain  memoranda,  preserved  by 
his  disciples,  of  their  conversations  with  Confucius  and  to 
have  been  collected  after  his  death  by  the  followers  of  his 
disciples.  The  key-note  of  these  discourses  is  that  virtue 
placed  by  the  Chinese  of  all  ages  above  every  other,  namely, 
filial  piety.  Tlie  love  of  one’s  parents  has  become  almost 
a craze  among  the  Chinese,  the  cultivation  of  which  has 
led  many  of  them  to  the  most  wonderful  eccentricities. 
Filial  love  is  the  basis  of  all  that  is  good  and  proper  in 
family  life;  and  brotherly  submission,  the  respect  due  to 
the  senior  by  the  junior,  is  closely  connected  with  it.  The 
state  with  its  government  is  merely  family  life  on  a larger 
scale.  The  filial  love  of  the  people  is  shown  in  obedience 
to  its  parents,  the  ruler  and  his  government.  In  one  of 
his  definitions  of  filial  piety,  Confucius  simply  explains  it 
by  “obedience.”  The  obedience  due  to  a father  by  his 
child  is  also  due  to  the  sovereign  by  his  subjects.  Man  in 
his  relation  to  the  world  is  considered  from  five  points  of 
view : (1)  sovereign  and  subject,  (2)  father  and  son,  (3)  hus- 
band and  wife,  (4)  elder  and  younger  brother,  (5)  friend 
and  friend.  In  each  of  these  relations  man  has  his  duties, 
the  proper  discharge  of  which  by  all  will  insure  good  gov- 
ernment and  general  peace  and  happiness.  Similar  ques- 
tions are  treated  in  the  Lun-yu.  The  considerations  due 
to  these  relations  determine  the  character  of  “man  as  he 
ought  to  be,”  “the  superior  man,”  “the  true  gentleman,” 
or  whatever  translation  we  may  give  to  the  Chinese  term 
kun-tzi,  the  proper  creation  of  Confucius’s  mind. 

(2)  Ta-hio,  “The  Great  Learning,”  a treatise  on  self- 
culture, based  on  knowledge  as  a means  of  reforming 
society. 


THE  AGE  OF  LAU-TZI  AND  CONFUCIUS  255 


(3)  Chung-yung,  “The  Doctrine  of  the  Mean,”  also  trans- 
lated by  “The  Golden  Medium.”  The  superior  man  will 
in  all  his  views  and  doings  “ stand  erect  in  the  middle  with- 
out inclining  to  either  side.”  It  is  the  path  of  the  philoso- 
pher which  the  sage  advises  him  to  pursue.  He  does  the 
right  thing  for  its  own  sake,  whether  the  world  regards  him 
or  not. 

(4)  Mdng-tzi,  “The  Philosopher  Mong,”  (whose  proper 
name  was  Mong  K’o),  well  known  among  foreigners  under 
the  Latinized  name  of  Mencius,  which  stands  for  Mong-tzi, 
just  as  the  term  K’ung-fu-tzi,  the  “Philosopher  K’ung,” 
has  been  Latinized  into  Confucius.  Mencius  lived  several 
generations  after  Confucius,  372-289  b.c.,  but,  after  its 
founder,  was  the  principal  representative  of  the  Confucian 
school.  The  above-mentioned  work,  bearing  his  name,  is 
a record  and  compilation  of  his  teachings.  It  is  similar  in 
style  to  the  Lun-yu  inasmuch  as  in  it  accounts  of  conversa- 
tions prevail.  The  doctrines  embodied  in  it,  which  mainly 
concern  government  matters,  will  be  referred  to  later  on. 
Although  in  this  work  Confucius  himself  is  but  occasionally 
introduced  as  having  said  certain  things,  the  view’s  ex- 
pressed by  Mencius  and  his  disciples  form  part  of  the  Con- 
fucian doctrines. 

The  great  influence  of  Confucius’s  personality  on  national 
life  in  China  was  due  not  only  to  his  writings  and  his 
teachings  as  recorded  by  others,  but  also  to  his  doings. 
His  personal  character,  as  described  by  his  disciples  and  in 
the  accounts  of  later  writers,  some  of  which  may  be  en- 
tirely legendary,  has  become  the  pattern  for  millions  of 
those  who  are  bent  on  imitating  the  outward  manners  of  a 
great  man.  The  tenth  book  of  the  “Analects,”  describing 
the  demeanor  of  Confucius  in  all  the  relations  of  life, — his 


254 


THE  ANCIEiNT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


acter  of  the  work,  the  twenty  books  of  which  are  supposed 
to  have  originated  from  certain  memoranda,  preserved  by 
his  disciples,  of  their  conversations  with  Confucius  and  to 
have  been  collected  after  his  death  by  the  followers  of  his 
disciples.  The  key-note  of  these  discourses  is  that  virtue 
placed  by  the  Chinese  of  all  ages  above  every  other,  namely, 
filial  piety.  The  love  of  one’s  parents  has  become  almost 
a craze  among  the  Chinese,  the  cultivation  of  which  has 
led  many  of  them  to  the  most  wonderful  eccentricities. 
Filial  love  is  the  basis  of  all  that  is  good  and  proper  in 
family  life;  and  brotherly  submission,  the  respect  due  to 
the  senior  by  the  junior,  is  closely  connected  with  it.  The 
state  with  its  government  is  merely  family  life  on  a larger 
scale.  The  filial  love  of  the  people  is  shown  in  obedience 
to  its  parents,  the  ruler  and  his  government.  In  one  of 
his  definitions  of  filial  piety,  Confucius  simply  explains  it 
by  "obedience.”  The  obedience  due  to  a father  by  his 
child  is  also  due  to  the  sovereign  by  his  subjects.  Man  in 
his  relation  to  the  world  is  considered  from  five  points  of 
view : (1)  sovereign  and  subject,  (2)  father  and  son,  (3)  hus- 
band and  wife,  (4)  elder  and  younger  brother,  (5)  friend 
and  friend.  In  each  of  these  relations  man  has  his  duties, 
the  proper  discharge  of  which  by  all  will  insure  good  gov- 
ernment and  general  peace  and  happiness.  Similar  ques- 
tions are  treated  in  the  Lun-yu.  The  considerations  due 
to  these  relations  determine  the  character  of  "man  as  he 
ought  to  be,”  "the  superior  man,”  "the  true  gentleman,” 
or  whatever  translation  we  may  give  to  the  Chinese  term 
kun-tzi,  the  proper  creation  of  Confucius’s  mind. 

(2)  Ta-hio,  "The  Great  Learning,”  a treatise  on  self- 
culture, based  on  knowledge  as  a means  of  reforming 
society. 


THE  AGE  OF  LAU-TZI  AND  CONFUCIUS  255 


(3)  Chung-yung,  "The  Doctrine  of  the  Mean,”  also  trans- 
lated by  "The  Golden  Medium.”  The  superior  man  will 
in  all  his  views  and  doings  " stand  erect  in  the  middle  with- 
out inclining  to  either  side.”  It  is  the  path  of  the  philoso- 
pher which  the  sage  advises  him  to  pursue.  He  does  the 
right  thing  for  its  own  sake,  whether  the  world  regards  him 
or  not. 

(4)  Mdng-tzi,  "The  Philosopher  Mong,”  (whose  proper 
name  was  Mong  K’o),  well  known  among  foreigners  under 
the  Latinized  name  of  Mencius,  which  stands  for  Mdng-tzi, 
just  as  the  term  K’ung-fu-tzi,  the  "Philosopher  K’ung,” 
has  been  Latinized  into  Confucius.  Mencius  lived  several 
generations  after  Confucius,  372-289  b.c.,  but,  after  its 
founder,  was  the  principal  representative  of  the  Confucian 
school.  The  above-mentioned  work,  bearing  his  name,  is 
a record  and  compilation  of  his  teachings.  It  is  similar  in 
style  to  the  Lun-yu  inasmuch  as  in  it  accounts  of  conversa- 
tions prevail.  The  doctrines  embodied  in  it,  which  mainly 
concern  government  matters,  will  be  referred  to  later  on. 
Although  in  this  work  Confucius  himself  is  but  occasionally 
introduced  as  having  said  certain  things,  the  views  ex- 
pressed by  Mencius  and  his  disciples  form  part  of  the  Con- 
fucian doctrines. 

The  great  influence  of  Confucius’s  personality  on  national 
life  in  China  was  due  not  only  to  his  writings  and  his 
teachings  as  recorded  by  others,  but  also  to  his  doings. 
His  personal  character,  as  described  by  his  disciples  and  in 
the  accounts  of  later  writers,  some  of  which  may  be  en- 
tirely legendary,  has  become  the  pattern  for  millions  of 
those  who  are  bent  on  imitating  the  outward  manners  of  a 
great  man.  The  tenth  book  of  the  "Analects,”  describing 
the  demeanor  of  Confucius  in  all  the  relations  of  life,  — his 


256 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


dress,  his  food,  his  behavior  in  the  company  of  friends,  etc., 
— represents  him  as  a man  full  of  caprice,  even  from  a 
Chinese  point  of  view.  Whatever  he  did  in  public  was 
regulated  to  the  minutest  detail  by  ceremony.  This  was 
no  invention  of  his  own,  since  ceremonial  life  had  been 
cultivated  many  centuries  before  Confucius;  but  his 
authority  and  example  did  much  to  perpetuate  what  he 
considered  desirable  social  practices.  Legge'  quotes  the 
following  peculiarities  from  this  memorable  biographical 
record : — 

“In  public,  whether  in  the  village,  the  temple,  or  the  court,  he 
was  the  man  of  rule  and  ceremony,  but  at  home  he  was  not  formal. 
Yet  if  not  formal,  he  was  particular.  In  bed  even  he  did  not  for- 
get himself;  ‘ he  did  not  lie  like  a corpse,’ and ‘he  did  not  speak.’ 
‘ He  required  his  sleeping  dress  to  be  half  as  long  again  as  his  body.’ 
‘If  he  happened  to  be  sick,  and  the  prince  came  to  visit  him,  he 
had  his  face  to  the  east,  caused  his  court  robes  to  be  put  over  him, 
and  drew  his  girdle  across  them.’ 

“ ‘ He  was  nice  in  his  diet,  not  disliking  to  have  his  rice  dressed 
fine,  nor  to  have  his  minced  meat  cut  small.’  ‘Anything  at  all 
gone  he  would  not  touch.’  ‘He  must  have  his  meat  cut  properly, 
and  to  every  kind  its  proper  sauce;  but  he  was  not  a great  eater.’ 
‘ It  was  only  in  wine  that  he  laid  down  no  limit  to  himself ; but  he 
did  not  allow  himself  to  be  confused  by  it.’  ‘When  the  villagers 
were  drinking  together,  on  those  who  carried  staves  going  out,  he 
went  out  immediately  after.’  ‘There  must  always  be  ginger  at 
the  table’;  and  ‘when  eating,  he  did  not  converse.’  ‘Although 
his  food  might  be  coarse  rice  and  poor  soup,  he  would  offer  a little 
of  it  in  sacrifice,  with  a grave  and  respectful  air.’ 

“ ‘ On  occasion  of  a sudden  clap  of  thunder,  or  a violent  wind,  he 
would  change  countenance.  He  would  do  the  same,  and  rise  up 
moreover,  when  he  found  himself  a guest  at  a loaded  board.’  ‘At 
the  sight  of  a person  in  mourning  he  would  also  change  countenance, 
and  if  he  happened  to  be  in  his  carriage,  he  would  bend  forward 

‘ The  Chinese  Classics,  vol.  i.  Prolegomena,  p.  89  seqq. 


THE  AGE  OF  LAU-TZI  AND  CONFUCIUS  257 


with  a respectful  salutation.’  ‘His  general  way  in  his  carriage 
was  not  to  turn  his  head  round,  nor  talk  hastily,  nor  point  with 
his  hands.’  ‘He  was  charitable.’  ‘When  any  of  his  friends  died 
if  there  were  no  relations  who  could  be  depended  on  for  the  neces- 
sary offices  he  would  say,  “I  will  bury  him.’”” 

We  have  to  take  into  consideration  that  these  accounts 
were  written  not  by  Confucius  himself,  but  by  an  admiring 
set  of  juniors.  Those  many  whims  which,  in  the  eyes  of 
Europeans  of  the  twentieth  century,  appear  as  weaknesses, 
may  lessen  our  respect  for  the  sage’s  genius;  but  they  will 
not  diminish  the  esteem  in  which  we  must  hold  the  spotless 
virtue  of  his  life. 


B 


THE  CONTENDING  STATES 


VIII 


THE  CONTENDING  STATES 

§ 52.  Yuan-wang  (475-469  b.c.) 

WE  left  the  reign  of  King^-wang  (see  above,  p.  234) 
with  the  two  southern  states  Wu  and  Yiie  at  war 
with  each  other.  During  the  reign  of  his  successor 
Yiian-wang,  Kou-tsien,  the  king  of  Yiie,  who  had  at  first  been 
utterly  routed  by  the  forces  of  his  enemy,  the  king  of  Wu, 
succeeded  in  a final  campaign  in  making  an  end  of  the  Wu 
dynasty,  and  annexed  its  state  to  his  dominions.  After 
his  defeat  by  the  king  of  Wu,  Kou-tsien  had  been  allowed, 
as  an  act  of  grace,  a little  strip  of  territory;  and  during 
the  years  that  followed  his  defeat  “he  slept  on  firewood 
and  tasted  gall,”  ^ — a phrase  which  has  since  come  into 
common  use  for  the  expression  of  resentment  at  great 
humiliation  coupled  with  the  determination  to  take  revenge. 
And  revenge  Kou-tsien  took  when,  a few  years  later,  he 
rallied  his  forces  and  wiped  out  every  trace  of  his  old 
enemy.  He  was  at  first  inclined  to  requite  the  generosity 

' This  phrase  occurs  in  an  edict  of  the  Empress  Dowager  (Octo- 
ber 2,  1901),  where  she  refers  to  the  period  of  trouble  through  w'hich 
the  imperial  court  had  just  passed  after  its  exile  to  the  western 
capital  Si-an-fu.  It  is  one  of  those  historical  allusions  by  which, 
through  the  mere  insertion  of  a few  words,  a whole  perspective  of 
ideas  is  opened  to  the  reader  well  versed  in  classical  and  historical 
literature,  though  seldom  noticed  by  interpreters  working  with 
no  better  help  than  a native  secretary,  who  may  or  may  not  call 
attention  to  them. 


261 


262 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


previously  shown  to  him ; but  his  minister  advised 
him,  for  political  reasons,  to  desist  from  the  exhibition 
of  such  good  nature  lest  the  king  of  Wu  might  again 
turn  upon  him.  The  king  of  Wu  thereupon  committed 
suicide,  and  Kou-tsien,  now  master  of  the  two  king- 
doms, became  one  of  the  most  powerful  supporters  of 
Yiian-wang. 

The  Ch’un-ts’iu  period,  so  called  from  the  historical  classic 
of  that  name,  the  main  text  of  which  is  ascribed  to  Con- 
fucius himself,  must,  of  course,  be  considered  as  closed 
before  the  death  of  its  author.  The  Tso-chuan  commentary 
carries  its  accounts  about  seventeen  years  farther  on,  thus 
covering  Yiian-wang’s  reign.  About  this  time  commences, 
according  to  some  authorities,  that  period  of  the  Chou 
dynasty  which  precedes  its  downfall,  and  which  is  known 
by  the  name  of  Chan-kuo,  “the  Contending  States.”  The 
history  of  this  period,  which  covers  rather  more  than  the 
last  two  centuries  of  the  dynasty,  is  described  in  a work 
entitled  Chan-kuo-ts’6,  “Documents  relating  to  the  Con- 
tending States,”  unless  ts’d  here  means  as  much  as  “strata- 
gems,” or,  as  Grube  suggests,  “counsels.”  The  Contend- 
ing States  witnessed  the  most  wretched  times  of  Chinese 
history  from  a political  point  of  view.  Had  there 
been  a powerful  neighbor  on  the  Asiatic  continent  in 
those  days,  China  would  have  been  absorbed,  as  indeed 
she  finally  was,  by  one  of  her  own  princes.  Public  mo- 
rality was  at  its  lowest  ebb ; and  yet  some  of  the 
country’s  unforgotten  patriots  and  some  of  its  great 
philosophers  flourished  during  this  troublous  period.  The 
reign  of  Yiian-wang  was  still  a comparatively  easy  one. 
Times  began  to  be  more  serious  under  his  son  Chon-ting- 
wang. 


THE  CONTENDING  STATES 


263 


§ 53.  Chon-ting-wang  (468-441  b.c.) 

Under  this  ruler  internal  troubles  disorganized  several 
of  the  once  powerful  states.  Six  grandees  of  the  state  of 
Tsin  wrangled  about  supremacy ; two  of  these  were  defeated 
and  the  remaining  four  divided  their  possessions.  The 
duke  himself  had  to  take  refuge  in  a neighboring  state. 
The  southern  kingdom  of  Ch’u  conquered  two  of  the  middle 
states.  The  one  satisfactory  feature  in  Chon-ting-wang’s 
reign  was  the  partly  successful  warfare  of  the  states  of 
Ts’in  and  Tsin  against  the  Jung  barbarians,  probably 
Huns,  who,  with  the  exception  of  one  tribe  called  I-k’ii, 
ceased  to  make  inroads  into  China. 

§ 54.  K’au-wang  (440-426  b.c.) 

K’au-wang,  who  was  one  of  the  younger  sons  of  Chon- 
ting-wang,  fought  his  way  to  the  throne  through  two 
palace  revolutions,  in  which  two  of  his  elder  brothers  fell 
victims.  The  rightful  heir  to  the  throne  was  the  eldest 
son,  who  reigned  just  three  months  under  the  name  of 
Ai-wang,  when  he  was  killed  by  his  next  brother,  who 
reigned  five  months  under  the  name  Ssl-wang,  and  who,  in 
turn,  was  killed  by  K’au-wang,  the  third  brother.  In  the 
state  of  Tsin  the  power  of  the  reigning  duke  had  dwindled 
to  a mere  nominal  title,  and  the  control  of  this  important 
territory,  which  had  been  considerably  increased  in  the 
course  of  generations  by  conquest  among  the  neighboring 
barbarians,  now  lay  chiefly  in  the  hands  of  the  three  families 
of  Han,  Chau,  and  Wei. 

§ 55.  Wei-lie-wang  (425-402  b.c.) 

Under  this  title  K’au-wang’s  son  reigned  twenty-four 
years.  Three  powerful  families  in  Tsin  were  recognized 


264 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


by  the  emperor  in  403  b.c.  as  the  heads  of  so  many  feudal 
states.  They  are  henceforth  known  in  Chinese  history  as 
San-Tsin,  “the  Three  Tsin  States.”  Their  chiefs  had 
hitherto  held  the  rank  of  marquis  and  were  now  officially 
confirmed  as  chu-h6u,  “Princes  of  the  Empire.”  The 
year  403  b.c.  marks  an  epoch  in  Chinese  history,  as  regards 
both  the  course  of  events  and  the  sources  from  which  we 
draw  our  information.  The  next  following  period  of  the 
Contending  States,  as  described  in  the  Chan-kuo-ts’d,  re- 
ceives much  additional  light  from  the  works  of  the  minor 
philosophers  living  at  the  end  of  the  Chou  dynasty  and 
from  those  of  some  later  authors,  including,  of  course, 
the  Shi-ki  of  Ssi-ma  Ts’ien.  These  are  also  the  main 
sources  for  the  sixty-one  years  preceding  the  elevation  of 
the  three  Tsin  usurpers. 

From  this  time,  that  is,  from  the  year  403  b.c.,  — which  is 
also  the  year  from  which  some  of  the  conflicting  authori- 
ties date  the  period  of  the  Contending  States,  — starts  the 
account  of  the  T’ung-kien-kang-mu,  the  work  of  the  great 
historian  Ssi-ma  Kuang,  who  submitted  it  to  his  emperor 
in  1066  A.D.  The  original  work,  styled  Tzi-chi-t’ung-kien, 
literally,  “ Universal  Mirror  to  benefit  Government,”  was  an 
enumeration  of  historical  facts  in  chronological  order  some- 
what in  the  style  of  the  Ch’un-ts’iu,  The  philosopher  Chu 
Hi  suggested  an  extension  of  the  work  in  the  shape  of  a 
commentary  somewhat  like  the  Tso-chuan,  and  this  plan 
was  carried  out  by  Chu  Hi’s  disciples,  who  laid  the  com- 
pleted work  before  the  throne  in  1223.  Later  editions 
of  this  standard  work  were  again  considerably  enlarged; 
and  they  now  form  the  most  complete,  though  not  the  most 
ancient,  handbook  of  Chinese  general  history.  Under 
Kublai  Khan,  in  1282,  the  work  was  translated  into 


THE  CONTENDING  STATES 


265 


the  Uigur  language.*  The  Emperor  K’ang-hi  (1662-1723) 
ordered  it  to  be  translated  into  the  Manchu  language; 
and  the  celebrated  French  missionary  Abbe  de  Moyria  de 
Maillac,  known  as  Father  de  Mailla,  undertook  the  gigantic 
work  of  translating  its  main  substance  into  French.  De 
Mailla  died  and  was  buried  with  unprecedented  honors  at 
Peking  in  1748;  but  his  manuscript  had  already  been  sent 
to  Paris,  and  it  was  published  by  the  Abbe  Grosier  in  thir- 
teen quarto  volumes  under  the  title  “ Histoire  Generale  de 
la  Chine  ” (Paris,  1777-1785).  De  Mailla,  who  spent  forty- 
five  years  of  his  life  on  Chinese  soil,  had  surrounded  him- 
self with  ail  the  literary  aids  of  an  extensive  Chinese  library 
and  had  acquired  a deep  knowledge  of  both  the  Chinese  and 
Manchu  languages.  Speaking  of  the  Tung-kien-kang-mu, 
he  says  in  his  Preface  (p.  6),  '‘Telle  est  I’histoire  que  I’em- 
pereur  Kang-hi  a fait  traduire  en  Tartare,  et  dont  j’entre- 
prends  de  donner  la  traduction.”  It  would  appear  from 
this  that  he  made  use  of  the  original  and  Manchu  versions 
in  preparing  his  translation,  which  is  the  most  detailed 
work  on  the  history  of  China  hitherto  published  in  any 
language.  It  should,  of  course,  be  read  with  caution,  since 
the  author,  with  the  exception  of  a few  quotations  of  the 
sources  in  the  beginning  of  his  work,  hardly  ever  refers  to  the 
Chinese  authorities  responsible  for  the  several  historical 
statements.  He  simply  reproduces  the  matters  of  fact  he 
was  able  to  gather  from  that  huge  collection  of  quotations 
derived  from  the  entire  Chinese  literature  contained  in  the 
Chinese  or  Manchu  text  without  examining  into  their  histor- 

* See  Herbert  A.  Giles,  Note  on  Four  Chinese  Volumes  sent  for  Identi- 
fication (Cambridge,  October  7,  1901),  from  which  the  above  dates 
have  been  derived.  See  also  the  elaborate  essay  in  Wylie,  Aoies  on 
Chinese  Literature,  p.  20  seqq. 


266 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


ical  value.  Sinological  research  has,  moreover,  made 
rapid  strides  since  De  Mailla’s  time,  which  causes  us  to 
look  upon  the  subject  from  an  entirely  different  point  of 
view. 

Returning  to  the  three  states  of  Han,  Wei,  and  Chau: 
Ssi-ma  Kuang  seems  to  have  been  dominated  by  an  in- 
stinctive idea  that  the  emperor’s  weakness  in  raising  the 
illegitimate  usurpers  to  the  highest  positions  in  their  terri- 
tories marked  a great  epoch  in  the  development  of  China. 
If  the  Son  of  Heaven  had  been  reduced  to  a mere  shadow 
for  centuries  up  to  this  time,  he  had  been  at  least  the  nomi- 
nal head  of  his  vassals.  Now  all  tradition  was  broken. 
The  sacredness  of  the  imperial  will  could  not  prevent  the 
dukes  of  Tsin  from  losing  their  inherited  rights,  which  they 
had  held  ever  since  their  forefathers  had  been  invested  with 
their  domain  under  Ch’ong-wang  in  1106  b.c.  The  empire 
then  consisted  of  fourteen  states,  the  most  powerful  among 
which,  Ts’in,  Ch’u,  Ts’i,  Yen,  Han,  Chau,  and  Wei,  became 
subsequently  known  as  ts’i-hiung,  “the  Seven  Heroes.” 
Among  these  the  boundary  states  of  Ts’in,  Chau,  and  Ch’u 
enjoyed  the  advantage  of  unlimited  capability  of  extension 
at  the  expense  of  the  foreign  tribes  surrounding  China, 
and  the  same  influences  which  at  the  close  of  the  Shang 
dynasty  had  brought  the  duchy  of  Chou,  with  Won-wang 
and  Wu-wang,  into  prominence,  may  have  then  been  at 
work  infusing  into  them  some  of  the  energetic  spirit  of 
their  uncivilized  but  warlike  neighbors. 

Ts’in  had  long  ago  outgrown  its  original  territories  in  the 
valley  of  the  Wei  River;  native  maps  of  the  Contending 
States  extend  its  boundaries  far  into  territories  formerly 
occupied  by  Jung  tribes,  comprising  the  present  Shen-si 
province,  with  the  Ordus  country  and  some  regions  of  the 


THE  CONTENDING  STATES 


267 


Man  barbarians  down  to  the  Yang-tzi  River  boundary 
of  Ssi-ch’uan. 

Chau  occupied  an  equally  exposed  territory  in  Shan-si, 
and  its  importance  also  was  due  to  its  geographical  position. 
With  its  capital  near  the  present  Kuang-p’ing-fu  in  western 
Chi-li,  it  occupied  the  northern  confines  of  China,  including 
the  present  north  Shan-si,  the  mountain  defiles  of  which 
have  so  often  served  as  thoroughfares  for  the  irruptions  of 
Huns,  Turks,  and  Mongols  coming  from  the  great  steppe. 

Ch’u,  as  we  have  seen,  was  the  country  of  the  Man  bar- 
barians in  the  south.  Its  rulers  and  government  officials 
may  have  been  Chinese,  and  Chinese  modes  of  life  were 
probably  cultivated  at  the  court  of  its  kings  as  much  as  in 
the  other  states;  but  it  seems  natural  that  in  a country 
which  for  centuries  had  effected  its  growth  by  absorbing 
foreign  elements,  as  must  have  been  the  case  with  the  state 
of  Ch’u  in  its  extension  toward  the  south,  the  character  of 
the  people  could  not  be  maintained  in  its  original  purity. 
As  the  barbarians  became  semi-civilized,  their  Chinese 
leaders  were  infected  with  barbarian  qualities ; and  the  inter- 
marriages which  took  place  here,  as  in  the  other  boundary 
states,  between  Chinese  and  aboriginal  families  may  have 
tended  to  infuse  new  blood  into  the  veins  of  both,  thus 
creating  a population  comparing  well  in  energy  and  cour- 
age with  the  more  effeminate  though  more  refined  inhabit- 
ants of  the  interior  and  eastern  coast  states.  I,  therefore, 
readily  adopt  a theory  advanced  by  Chavannes,  who* 
says : — 

“Ts’in  and  Ch’u  were  not,  in  the  proper  sense  of  the  word,  to  be 
comprised  among  the  kingdoms  of  the  Middle.  Their  populations, 
though  civilized  by  the  Chinese,  were  of  different  races.  From 

* Les  Memoires  historiques,  vol.  v,  p.  1 seqq. 


268 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


the  time  when  Tsin  and  Ts’i  fell  victims  to  internal  dissensions, 
Ts’in  and  Ch’u  became  the  leading  actors  in  that  drama  destined 
to  end  with  the  triumph  of  Ts’in  and  the  establishment  of  the 
empire  by  Ts’in  Shi-huang-ti  in  221  b.c.  We  may  thus  say  that 
the  revolution  which  finally  led  to  the  establishment  of  imperial 
China  can  be  traced  to  the  year  403  b.c.,  and  that  this  is  the  reason 
why  Ssi’-ma  Kuang  makes  this  year  the  starting  point  of  his  great 
history  entitled  Tzi-chi-t’ung-kien.” 

This,  it  appears  to  me,  is  the  only  theory  which  helps  to 
explain  quite  a number  of  cultural  problems  encountered 
by  the  student  of  Chinese  history  a few  centuries  later  in 
the  shape  of  important  changes  that  must  have  taken  place 
in  the  popular  views  of  the  masses,  in  folk-lore,  supersti- 
tions, and  art.  We  possess  the  most  plausible  arguments 
for  the  introduction  of  foreign  influences  in  Chinese  culture 
at  the  time  when  relations  with  western  Asia  were  opened 
under  the  Emperor  Wu-ti  at  the  end  of  the  second  century 
B.c. ; but  if  we  examine  numerous  facts  still  on  record  as 
referring  to  times  immediately  preceding  the  Wu-ti  period, 
we  are  bound  to  notice  that  changes  of  a different  kind  had 
come  over  the  Chinese  of  this  as  compared  with  those  of 
the  Confucian  and  pre-Confucian  periods.  The  growing 
influence  of  foreign  elements  from  Ts’in  in  the  west,  Chau 
in  the  north,  and  Ch’u  in  the  south  may  account  for  this. 
Possibly  much  of  what  impresses  us  as  new  under  the  Ts’in 
dynasty  and  the  early  part  of  the  western  Han  had  existed 
for  centuries  before  those  times.  For  we  must  not  forget 
that  our  main  sources  down  to  the  end  of  the  Ch’un-ts’iu 
period  originate  with  writers  of  the  Confucian  school,  who 
would  not  place  on  record  facts  and  ideas  at  variance  with 
their  own  views ; and  it  is  quite  possible  that  ancient  China, 
as  represented  to  us  by  Confucian  writers,  would  appear 
quite  different  if  other  sources  existed.  The  little  we  know 


THE  CONTENDING  STATES 


269 


of  Lau-tzi  as  a personage  and  of  the  teachings  which  became 
the  germ  of  Tauism  is  an  almost  foreign  element  in  Con- 
fucian  China,  and  this  seems  to  confirm  our  theory;  for 
Lau-tzi,  as  a native  of  the  state  of  Ch’u,  was  born,  and 
probably  brought  up,  among  the  southern  barbarians. 

The  Chau  family,  which  now  seems  to  have  become  the 
strongest  among  the  three  usurpers  of  Tsin,  was  of  old 
standing  in  that  state.  Its  pedigree  is  traced  to  a common 
origin  with  the  Ts’in  princes  at  the  time  of  Chou-sin,  the 
last  monarch  of  the  Shang  dynasty,  when  two  brothers  be- 
came the  respective  ancestors  of  the  two  lines  of  Ts’in  and 
Chau.  The  Emperor  Mu  of  the  Chou  dynasty  was  accom- 
panied in  one  of  his  expeditions  by  a member  of  this  family 
as  his  charioteer;  and  he  rewarded  him  with  the  city  of 
Chau  in  the  present  South  Shan-si.  The  power  of  the 
family  was  further  augmented  by  gifts  of  territory  under 
the  dukes  of  Tsin.  We  have  met  the  names  of  members  of 
this  remarkable  family  on  former  occasions.  Chau  Ts’ui 
had  been  the  companion  of  Duke  Won  of  Tsin  during  his 
voluntary  exile  among  the  Tartars,  and  after  his  return 
had  become  prime  minister  of  Tsin.  His  son  and  successor 
in  office,  Chau  Tun,  was  the  son  of  a Tartar*  wife.  But 
Chau  Tun  was  not  the  only  bastard  in  the  family.  Chau 
Siang-tzi,  who  died  after  a reign  of  thirty-three  years  in 
425  B.C.,  and  whose  personal  name  was  Wu-sii,  was  also 
the  son  of  a Tartar  wife,  and  he  himself  married  a Tartar 
woman.^  Need  we  be  astonished,  therefore,  to  find  that  in- 


' Chavannes,  op.  cit.,  vol.  v,  p.  13.  His  son  Chau  Sho  and  his 
posthumous  child  Chau  Wu  were  the  subject  of  the  romantic  drama 
of  the  Mongol  period  translated  by  St.  Julien  in  his  L’orphelin  de  la 
Chine  (Syntaxe  nouvelle,  etc.,  vol.  ii,  p.  309  seqq.). 

* Chavannes,  op.  cit.,  pp.  32,  51. 


270 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


fluences  quite  foreign  to  Chinese  tradition  were  even  then  at 
work  in  the  introduction  of  hitherto  unknown  elements  in 
the  life  of  these  quasi-Chinese  princes  ? Altogether,  readers 
of  the  history  of  Chau,  as  represented  in  Ssi-ma  Ts’ien’s 
account,  will  receive  the  impression  that  it  contains  various 
prognostics  of  that  important  change  in  cultural  life  which 
became  dominant  in  the  age  of  Ts’in  Shi-huang-ti ; namely, 
a Tartarized  China,  the  traditional  Confucian  views  of  life 
having  been  supplanted  by  Tartar,  Scythian,  Hunnic,  or 
Turkish  elements  — elements  that,  whatever  name  we  may 
give  them,  had  grown  out  of  the  national  life  of  central 
Asiatic  foreigners  and  that  now  began  to  disturb  the 
quiet  development  of  the  nation  whose  civil  code  was  the 
Ch6u-li  and  whose  model  gentleman  had  been  Confucius. 
Chavannes  * says  in  connection  with  the  history  of  Chau : — 

“You  will  remark  in  this  chapter  the  important  part  played  by 
the  Wonderful;  dreams,  predictions  and  visions  of  supernatural 
beings  will  be  found  in  it  in  much  greater  munbers  than  in  any  other 
part  of  the  Shi-ki.” 

Liu  An,  who  died  122  b.c.,  has  preserved  a characteristic 
anecdote  of  Chau  Siang-tzi.  The  interests  of  the  house  of 
Tsin  had,  after  its  fall,  been  represented  by  a faithful  ad- 
herent named  Chi  Po.  In  the  struggle  between  the  latter 
and  the  united  forces  of  Chau,  Han,  and  Wei,  Chi  Po  was 
killed,  and  Chau  Siang-tzi  took  possession  of  his  skull, 
which  he  had  made  into  a drinking  vessel.^ 

This  procedure,  which  I am  inclined  to  regard  as  a ritual 
act  rather  than  as  a whim  of  the  perpetrator,  seems  to 
speak  volumes  in  favor  of  Hunnic  influences,  since  we  have 
a perfect  parallel  in  the  history  of  the  Huns,  or  Hiung-nu, 

* Loc.  cit.,p.  8.  ’A  slightly  later  author  makes  it  “a  drinking  ves- 
sel varnished  or  lacquered.” 


THE  CONTENDING  STATES 


271 


under  their  Great  Khan  Lau-shang,  who  reigned  175  to 
160  B.C.,  and  who,  having  defeated  the  Yiie-chi,  or  Indo- 
Scythians,  decapitated  their  king  and  made  his  skull  into 
a drinking  vessel.  Chinese  archaeologists  have  quibbled  a 
good  deal  about  the  sense  of  the  word  translated  “ drinking 
vessel,”  some  holding  that  it  was  a cup  used  in  wine  feasts, 
others  giving  it  a still  more  cynical  interpretation ; but  the 
truth  is,  probably,  that  such  trophies  served  a ritual  pur- 
pose, since  we  learn  from  later  accounts  that  the  skull  of 
the  defeated  king  had  been  preserved  by  the  Hiung-nu  for 
generations,  and  that  it  was  reserved  for  a solemn  state 
act,  the  drinking  of  the  blood  of  a white  horse  in  taking  an 
oath  to  sanctify  the  conclusion  of  a treaty  of  peace.  Cha- 
vannes  ‘ refers  to  an  interesting  parallel  furnished  by  Livy,* 
who,  describing  a disaster  suffered  by  the  Romans  under 
their  consul  Lucius  Posthumius  in  216  b.c.  at  the  hands 
of  Gaulic  hordes,  says : — 

“The  Boii,  having  cut  off  his  head,  carried  it  and  the  spoils  they 
stripped  off  his  body  in  triumph  into  the  most  sacred  temple  they 
had.  Afterwards  they  cleansed  the  head  according  to  their  custom, 
and,  having  covered  the  skull  with  chased  gold,  used  it  as  a cup  for 
libations  in  their  solemn  festivals,  and  as  a drinking-cup  for  their 
high  priests  and  other  ministers  of  the  temple.”  ^ 

The  Boians,  who  then  occupied  certain  territories  in  the 
north  of  Italy,  were  a nation  of  very  doubtful  origin. 
Zeuss  * speaks  of  them  in  connection  with  Celtic  tribes, 
but,  in  view  of  the  conflicting  notices  of  classical  authors, 
thinks  they  may  have  come  across  the  Danube  from  the 
north;  and  he  quotes  a passage  from  Strabo  to  show  that 


‘Chavannes,  op.  cit.,  p.  50.  ^ xxiii,  ch.  24,  §§  11-12,  ed.  Weis- 
senborn.  ® Transl.  by  Spillan  and  Edmonds,  vol.  ii,  p.  180.  ‘ Die 
Deutschen  und  die  Nachbarstdmme,  Munich,  1837,  p.  244. 


272 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


at  one  time  they  occupied  the  Hercynian  forest  surrounding 
Bohemia.  The  skull  story  related  by  Livy  might  involve 
a hint  as  to  Scythian  origin ; but  it  will  be  difficult  to  prove 
that  Scythians  in  those  days  had  extended  their  wander- 
ings as  far  west  as  that,  though  they  are  said  to  have  been 
settled  near  the  lower  course  of  the  Danube. 

Another  instance  of  the  gi’adual  Tartarization,  if  we  may 
so  call  it,  of  Chinese  culture  was  chronicled  a few  genera- 
tions later,  when  the  king  of  Chau,  who  reigned  under  the 
name  of  Wu-ling  (329-299  b.c.),  resolved  for  political 
reasons  to  exchange  the  traditional  Chinese  court  dress  for 
that  of  a Tartar  ruler.  He  did  this  in  spite  of  the  re- 
monstrances of  several  members  of  his  family,  who  pleaded 
in  vain  for  the  retention  of  the  traditional  Chinese  eti- 
quette. The  manners  and  customs  of  antiquity,  he  thought, 
were  good  enough  for  the  ancients,  but  the  modern  man 
had  to  conform  to  the  requirements  of  his  time;  this  is 
the  leading  idea  of  the  replies  made  to  remonstrances  of  his 
friends,  as  recorded  by  Ssi-ma  Ts’ien.^ 

A still  more  thorough  change  made  by  Wu-ling  in  this 
process  of  Tartarization  was  the  introduction  of  cavalry 
in  the  army.  During  the  early  part  of  the  Chou  dynasty 

* Chavannes,  op.  cit.,  pp.  70-84.  Whatever  innovations  were 
implied  in  the  adoption  of  Tartar  dress,  were  attributed  to  king  Wu- 
ling  of  Chau,  who  is  supposed  to  have  been  the  first  to  break 
through  the  traditional  lines  in  regard  to  dress,  though  Tartar  cus- 
toms were  again  cultivated  on  a larger  scale  at  various  later  periods. 
It  appears  that  the  mode  of  dress  now  adopted  was  better  suited  to 
the  quick  movement  of  the  body.  Those  cumbrous  big  sleeves  of 
the  old  Chinese  court  robe  were  abandoned  for  narrower  shapes; 
and  the  sandals  and  shoes  of  straw  or  hemp  were  replaced  by  short 
boots,  varying  in  style  down  to  the  present  d5masty.  Indeed  King 
Wu-hng  is  credited  with  having  introduced  the  boot  into  the  Chinese 
gentleman’s  attire.  It  was  in  those  days  made  of  yellow  leather. 


THE  CONTENDING  STATES 


273 


the  horse  had  been  used  mainly  in  harness.  The  heroes 
of  Chinese  warfare  fought  on  chariots,  standing  up  and  not 
sitting,  accompanied,  of  course,  by  a retinue  of  pedestrians ; 
and  to  sit  astride  on  horseback  was  originally  not  a Chinese, 
but  a Hunnic  custom,  which  possibly  took  its  rise  from 
King  Wu-ling’s  adoption  of  cavalry  fighting.  I find  it 
stated  in  a later  commentary  on  the  Tso-chnan  that  riding 
on  horseback  did  not  become  customary  before  the  time 
of  the  “Six  States,”  i.e.  the  third  century  b.c.  The  king- 
dom of  Chau  had  absorbed  too  much  of  the  Tartar  element; 
and  the  purely  Chinese  subjects  of  King  Wu-ling  seem  to 
have  been  in  too  great  a minority  to  maintain  the  traditional 
conservative  spirit  of  an  original  Chinese  dynasty. 

§ 56.  An-wang  (401-376  b.c.) 

Under  this  emperor  a great  change  took  place  in  the 
state  of  Ts’i.  During  the  time  of  Duke  Huan  and  his 
minister  Kuan-tzi,  a prince  of  Ch’on  had  taken  refuge  in 
Ts’i,  whose  descendants  had  grown  into  a powerful  clan. 
For  some  reason  or  other  they  changed  their  name  to  T’ien. 
In  481  B.c.  a member  of  this  family  named  T’ien  Ch’ang 
had  managed  to  drive  Duke  Kien  of  Ts’i  from  the  throne, 
have  him  murdered  and  replaced  by  the  duke’s  younger 
brother,  who  made  him  his  minister.  His  grandson  T’ien 
Ho  in  410  B.c.  actually  deposed  the  then  reigning  duke, 
usurped  the  throne  for  himself,  and  was  finally  confirmed 
by  An-wang  as  Duke  of  Ts’i.  In  this  he  had  obtained  the 
good  offices  of  the  Marquis  of  Wei,  one  of  the  San-tsin. 
Another  state  of  Wei  (so  pronounced  at  present,  but  the 
sound  of  the  name  was  different  in  ancient  times)  had  given 
birth  to  one  of  the  typical  characters  of  the  time,  which. 


274 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


owing  to  the  easiness  with  which  men  of  talent  were  allowed 
to  wander  about  from  state  to  state,  produced  quite  a num- 
ber of  political  adventurers.  Wu  K’i  had  studied  with 
Tseng  Ts’an,  that  hyperfilial  disciple  of  Confucius  (505- 
437  B.C.),  but  did  not  agree  with  him.  He  emigrated  to 
Lu,  where  he  studied  the  art  of  warfare.  Uncontrollable 
ambition  led  him  to  hope  to  be  made  commander  of  the 
army  of  Lu  during  a war  between  that  state  and  its  northern 
neighbor  Ts’i.  The  Duke  of  Lu  appreciated  his  talent,  but 
would  not  appoint  him  because  his  wife  was  a Ts’i  woman. 
Wu  K’i  then  simply  killed  her  as  being  in  his  way,  and  the 
duke,  regarding  this  as  an  act  of  loyalty,  gave  him  the 
desired  appointment,  in  which  it  is  recorded  he  justified 
his  strategical  reputation.  After  this  he  took  service  under 
the  state  of  Wei,  but  in  387  b.c.  got  into  trouble  with  the 
government  and  fled  to  Ch’u  in  the  south,  where  King  Tau 
made  him  his  chancellor.  In  this  capacity  he  did  excellent 
work  and,  by  his  great  energy  and  severity  as  a military 
chief,  maintained  rigid  discipline  among  the  troops.  He, 
however,  also  made  enemies  among  the  grandees  of  the 
state,  who,  after  the  death  of  the  king,  conspired  against 
and  killed  him.  Under  the  name  Wu-tzi,  i.e.  “ the  Philoso- 
pher Wu,”  there  still  exists  a little  book  on  military  art 
said  to  have  been  written  by  him. 


§ 57.  Lie-wang  (375-369  b.c.) 

During  this  reign  the  state  of  Han  made  war  on  Chong, 
one  of  the  old  feudal  states  near  the  present  K’ai-fong-fu, 
and  conquered  its  territory.  Otherwise,  the  most  notable 
event  during  this  period  was  the  birth  (372  b.c.)  of  the  great 
philosopher  Mencius  in  the  state  of  Lu,  where  Confucius 


THE  CONTENDING  STATES 


275 


and  some  of  his  disciples  were  also  born.  There  the  usurper, 
T’i^n  Ho’s  successor,  had  in  the  meantime  assumed  the 
title  “King  of  Ts’i”;  but  the  Son  of  Heaven  having  pre- 
viously confirmed  his  family  in  their  usurpation,  he  remained 
loyal  to  him,  and  when  in  370  b.c.  an  assembly  of  the  feudal 
princes  was  summoned  to  the  imperial  court,  he  was  the 
only  one  who  did  homage  to  the  emperor.  Lie-wang  was 
succeeded  by  his  younger  brother  Hien-wang. 

§ 58.  Hien-wang  (368-321  b.c.) 

During  his  reign,  covering  nearly  half  a century,  Hi^n- 
wang  was  nothing  better  than  a silent  on-looker,  without 
the  slightest  power  to  interfere  in  the  endless  struggles 
between  his  nominal  vassals.  Ssi-ma  Ts’ien’s  account  of 
it  ‘ is  merely  a list  of  ceremonial  courtesies  shown  to  the 
dukes  of  Ts’in,  who  with  his  imperial  sanction  claimed 
hegemony  among  the  Contending  States  — a position  fore- 
casting the  shadows  of  future  events.  Ts’in  had,  as  Ssi-ma 
Ts’ien  says,*  kept  aloof  from  the  remaining  states,  not  even 
sending  ambassadors  to  their  peaceful  meetings;  and  the 
purely  Chinese  states  regarded  it  as  a barbarian  country. 

§ 59.  The  Philosophers  Yang  Chu  and  Mo  Ti 

Fighting  all  round  was  now  the  order  of  the  day,  fighting 
alike  with  arms  and  words;  for  the  several  philosophic 
schools  that  had  been  reared  on  the  foundations  laid  by 
Lau-tzi  and  Confucius  rose  against  each  other  in  a contest 
for  leadership  in  the  world  of  intellect,  fighting  as  vigor- 

* Chavannes,  op.  cit.,  vol.  i,  pp.  303-304.  ^ Chavannes,  op.  cit., 
vol.  ii,  p.  62. 


276 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


ously  as  the  several  confederate  states  in  their  endeavors 
to  annihilate  each  other  by  force  of  arms.  The  philoso- 
phers of  the  age  show  a tendency  to  apply  their  doctrines 
to  practical  state  life.  That  unsteadiness,  characteristic 
of  political  life  in  the  fourth  century  b.c.,  which  knew  of 
no  equilibrium  among  the  contesting  powers  and  which 
caused  even  conservative  minds  to  become  accustomed  to 
the  most  unexpected  changes  in  politics,  was  coupled  with 
a hitherto  unprecedented  freedom  of  thought  in  the  ranks 
of  thinkers  and  writers.  The  most  heretical  views  on  state 
and  private  life  were  advanced  and  gained  public  adherence. 
Certain  philosophers  became  the  fashion,  temporarily  over- 
shadowing the  sages  of  old ; and  in  the  energy  with  which 
they  tried  to  vindicate  the  creations  of  their  minds,  they 
parallel  the  political  leaders  of  the  Contending  States.  No 
greater  contrast  could  be  imagined  than  the  two  philoso- 
phers Yang  Chu  and  Mo  Ti,  who  probably  flourished  about 
this  time,  though  no  exact  dates  are  ascertainable.  We  may 
be  allowed,  however,  to  draw  conclusions  from  the  terms 
in  which  they  are  spoken  of  by  Mencius,  who  disap- 
proves of  both,  and  whose  antagonism  to  the  two  philoso- 
phers seems  to  show  that  they  must  have  occupied  the 
public  mind  not  very  long  before  he  wrote. 

Yang  Chu  impresses  us  as  one  of  the  most  original  think- 
ers China  has  produced.  He  did  not  study  old  books  like 
Confucius,  but,  having  bestowed  much  thought  on  the 
world  and  on  human  nature,  gave  utterance  to  his  views 
with  a freedom  bordering  on  cynicism.  The  main  part  of 
his  doctrines  is  contained  in  the  work  known  as  Lie-tzi, 
“The  Philosopher  Lie,”  according  to  Giles  ‘ a fictitious  title, 
covering  the  compilation  of  some  other  scholar;  but  some 
* Biographical  Dictionary,  p.  432,  no.  1251. 


THE  CONTENDING  STATES 


277 


of  his  sayings  are  also  referred  to  in  the  works  of  Chuang- 
tzi  and  notably  in  that  of  Mencius,  his  great  adversary/ 
Yang  Chu  was  essentially  a pessimist.  Is  life  actually 
worth  living?  We  may  conclude  that  it  is  not,  if  we  follow 
his  calculation,  according  to  which  so  great  a part  of  it  is 
spent  either  in  a state  of  indifference  during  infancy  and 
extreme  old  age,  or  in  sleep  and  during  many  hours  in  the 
daytime,  not  counting  the  hours  spent  in  pain  and  sickness, 
sorrow  and  bitterness.  In  a hundred  years  a man  may 
live  there  may  remain  ten  years  actually  worth  counting, 

* Besides  the  abstracts  from  the  chapter  on  Yang  Chu  in  Lie-tzi, 
communicated  by  Legge  in  the  Prolegomena  to  his  edition  of  Mencius, 
I wish  to  refer  to  Dr.  A.  Forke’s  excellent  paper  Yang-chu  the  Epicu- 
rean in  his  Relation  to  Lieh-tse  the  Pantheist  in  the  Journal  of  the 
Peking  Oriental  Society,  vol.  iii,  no.  3,  pp.  203-258.  Yang  Chu  holds 
that  the  best  use  one  can  make  of  wealth  is  to  procure  by  its  means 
all  sorts  of  personal  pleasure  and  distribute  the  residue  among  one’s 
fellow-creatures.  The  following  extract  is  from  Forke,  p.  239 : — 

“ Tuan-mu  Shu  of  Wei  was  a descendant  of  Tzi-kung.  His  patrimony 
procured  him  a treasure  of  ten  thousand  gold  pieces.  Indifferent 
to  the  devices  of  life,  he  followed  his  inclinations.  What  people  liked 
to  do  and  the  heart  delights  in,  he  would  do  and  delight  in.  As  for 
walls  and  buildings,  pavilions  and  verandahs,  gardens  and  parks, 
ponds  and  lakes,  wine  and  food,  carriages  and  dresses,  women  and 
attendants,  he  could  emulate  the  princes  of  Ts’i  and  Ch’u  in  luxury. 
Whenever  his  heart  desired  something,  his  ear  wished  to  hear  some- 
thing, his  eye  to  see  or  his  mouth  to  taste,  he  would  procure  it  at  all 
costs,  though  the  thing  might  only  be  had  in  a foreign  land  and  a 
far-off  country  and  not  in  the  kingdom  of  Ts’i,  just  as  if  he  had  it 
within  his  four  walls.  When  on  a journey,  mountains  and  rivers 
might  be  ever  so  difficult  and  dangerous  to  pass  and  the  roads  ever 
so  long,  he  would  still  proceed,  just  as  other  men  walk  a few  steps. 
A hundred  guests  were  entertained  daily  in  his  palace.  In  his  kitch- 
ens there  were  fire  and  smoke  uninterruptedly,  and  the  vaults  of 
his  hall  and  the  peristyle  incessantly  resounded  with  songs  and  music. 
The  remains  from  his  table  he  first  divided  amongst  his  clansmen, 
what  they  left  was  then  divided  amongst  his  fellow-citizens,  and  what 
these  did  not  eat  was  distributed  throughout  the  whole  kingdom.” 


278 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


but  '‘not  even  in  them  will  be  found  an  hour  of  smiling 
self-abandonment  without  the  shadow  of  solicitude”; 
for  'post  equitem  sedet  alra  cura.  Death  awaits  us  all  alike, 
whether  we  die  at  the  age  of  ten  or  of  a hundred;  and 
once  man’s  bones  are  rotten  it  does  not  matter  whether 
he  was  a great  character  like  Yau  and  Shun,  or  a mean 
creature  like  the  tyrants  Kie  and  Chou-sin.  We,  therefore, 
have  every  reason  to  make  the  best  of  life  while  it  lasts. 
To  Yang  Chu,  nothing  can  come  after  death.  Fame  is 
nothing.  The  great  men  of  the  past,  “ celebrate  them  — 
they  do  not  know  it ; reward  them  — they  do  not  know 
it;  their  fame  is  no  more  to  them  than  to  the  trunk  of  a 
tree  or  a clod  of  earth.” 

To  the  old  emperors  Yau,  Shun,  and  Yii,  to  Wu-wang 
and  Chou-kung,  who  spent  their  lives  in  toil  and  worry,  he 
compares  those  contemptible  last  monarchs  of  the  Hia  and 
Shang  dynasties  respectively,  Kie  and  Chou-sin,  who  were 
pleasure-hunters  all  their  lives  and  “ never  made  themselves 
bitter  by  the  thought  of  propriety  and  righteousness,  and 
died  like  all  of  us.”  Yet  theirs  was  a happy  life  in  spite  of 
the  evil  fame  that  followed  their  death.  For  the  reality 
of  enjoyment  is  what  no  fame  can  give.  Legge,‘  to  whose 
abstract  from  Yang  Chu’s  sayings  I would  refer,  adds:  — 

“It  would  be  doing  injustice  to  Epicurus  to  compare  Yang  with 
him,  for,  though  the  Grecian  philosopher  made  happiness  the  chief 
end  of  human  pursuit,  he  taught  also  that  ‘ we  cannot  live  pleasur- 
ably without  living  virtuously  and  justly.’  The  Epicurean  system 
is,  indeed,  unequal  to  the  capacity,  and  far  below  the  highest  com- 
placencies of  human  nature;  but  it  is  widely  different  from  the 
reckless  contempt  of  all  which  is  esteemed  good  and  great  that 
defiles  the  pages  where  Yang  is  made  to  tell  his  views.” 


‘ Mencius,  Prolegomena,  pp.  95-102. 


THE  CONTENDING  STATES 


279 


Yang  Chu’s  pessimism  is  also  of  a different  kind  from 
that  of  Schopenhauer,  which  abuts  in  altruistic  ethics  based 
on  compassion^  We  also  find  in  his  sayings  traces  of  that 
atheistic  fatalism  which  would  seem  to  absolve  man  from 
all  responsibility  for  his  doings  by  denying  the  freedom 
of  will.  For  “intelligence  and  stupidity,  honorableness 
and  meanness,  are  not  in  one’s  power,  neither  is  that  con- 
dition of  putridity,  decay,  and  utter  disappearance.  A 
man’s  life  is  not  in  his  own  hands,  nor  is  his  death ; his  in- 
telligence is  not  his  own,  nor  his  honorableness,  nor  his 
meanness.” 

It  stands  to  the  credit  of  the  Chinese  nation  that  a man 
of  Yang  Chu’s  type  was  not  placed  on  a level  with  their 
other  great  philosophers,  and  that  views  quite  different 
from  his  became  dominant  among  later  generations.  Yet, 
if  we  take  into  consideration  his  philosophy  of  private  life 
and  the  forcible  manner  with  which  he  seems  to  state  his 
argumentum  ad  hominem,  we  may  look  upon  him  as  an 
important  link  in  that  process  of  decay  which  brought  about 
the  fall  of  the  Chou  dynasty  and  the  ultimate  victory  of 
principles  which  culminated  in  the  burning  of  the  old 
sacred  books  under  a decree  of  the  Emperor  Ts’in  Shi- 
huang-ti.  For  what  we  observe  now  is  quite  analogous 
to  the  logic  of  Confucius  and  his  school,  which  made  the 
life  of  the  individual  the  basis  of  views  on  government 
and  public  life.  Yang  Chu’s  “egotism,”  first  applied  to 
individual  man  as  a member  of  society,  finally  reigned  su- 
preme among  the  authorities  responsible  for  the  welfare 
of  the  Contending  States,  each  of  whom  fought  for  the 
principle  “first  we  and  then  the  world,”  or  “apres  nous  le 
deluge.” 


> Grube,  op.  cit.,  p.  127. 


280 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


Confucianism  had  to  undergo  a severe  trial  in  those  days; 
and  the  example  set  by  Chinese  princes,  who  could  follow 
the  barbaric  custom  of  making  a lacquered  bowl  out  of  a 
dead  enemy’s  skull  or  don  the  uncanonical  dress  of  north- 
ern foreigners,  quite  corresponded  to  the  spirit  of  the  age, 
which  was  characterized  by  ruthless  contempt  of  the 
sacredness  of  tradition.  To  stick  to  tradition,  to  derive 
every  blessing  in  life  from  one’s  ancestors,  is  the  original 
Chinese  principle;  and  the  frequency  of  examples  betraying 
disregard  of  this  principle  that  we  now  meet  in  political  as 
well  as  in  literary  life  may  be  looked  upon  as  a symptom  of 
elements  originally  not  Chinese  having  temporarily  gained 
the  upper  hand.  This  may  be  shown  by  the  example  even 
of  Mo  Ti,  whose  teachings  were  diametrically  opposed  to 
those  of  Yang  Chu.  What  stamps  him  as  a son  of  his  time 
is  an  almost  revolutionary  independence  of  old  Chinese 
tradition.  Yang  Chu  and  Mo  Ti  “stood  at  the  opposite 
poles  of  human  thought  and  sentiment”  (Legge).  The 
views  of  the  latter  were  as  altruistic  as  those  of  the  former 
were  frivolous.  If  Mencius  treats  Mo  Ti  as  an  adversary, 
it  is  because  antiquity  was  not  so  sacred  to  him  as  it  de- 
served to  be  in  the  eyes  of  orthodox  Confucianists. 

Here  I have  to  say  a word  about  the  name  Mo  Ti,  the 
several  variants  in  the  spelling  of  which  may  mislead  readers 
of  Mo  Ti  literature.  The  sound  of  the  sage’s  family 
name,  which  means  “ink”  in  Chinese,  as  heard  in  most  of 
the  mandarin  dialects  in  China,  is  Mo;  in  Canton  it  is 
pronounced  Mak,  which  may  be  said  to  have  been  the 
sound  corresponding  to  the  ancient  pronunciation;  the 
final  consonant  has  left  its  traces  in  some  of  the  mandarin 
dialects  in  the  shape  of  the  abrupt  termination  of  the  vowel, 
which  some  transcribers  express  by  a final  h,  for  which 


THE  CONTENDING  STATES 


281 


reason  Williams  ‘ spells  Moh.  Morrison,  in  the  old-fash- 
ioned English  spelling,  gives  it  as  Mih,  and  Legge  follows 
him.  From  this  spelling  in  connection  wdth  the  designation 
tzl  {Mih-tzl,  i.e.  “Mih  or  Mo,  the  philosopher”)  has  arisen 
the  Latinized  name  Micius,  invented  by  Faber,  who  also 
calls  Lie-tzi  Licius  in  analogy  with  the  Latinized  names 
Confucius  and  Mencius. 

Mo  Ti  is  keenly  aware  of  the  rottenness  of  Chinese  state 
life.  In  trying  to  ascertain  its  prime  cause  he  comes  to 
the  conclusion  that  all  evils  arise  from  want  of  mutual  love; 
that  this  mutual  love  is  wanting  not  only  between  individu- 
als and  families,  but  between  states  also.  If  all  were  per- 
vaded by  this  spirit  of  love,  thieves  and  robbers  would  dis- 
appear, the  great  officers  would  cease  to  throw  one  another’s 
families  into  confusion,  and  princes  would  cease  to  attack 
one  another’s  dominions.  It  is  only  through  that  rmiversal 
and  mutual  love  that  the  empire  will  thrive.  He  sum- 
marizes the  evils  of  his  time  thus : — 

“The  mutual  attacks  of  state  on  state;  the  mutual  usurpations 
of  family  on  family;  the  mutual  robberies  of  man  on  man;  the 
want  of  kindness  on  the  part  of  the  sovereign  and  of  loyalty  on  the 
part  of  the  minister ; the  want  of  tenderness  and  filial  duty  between 
father  and  son  — these,  and  such  as  these,  are  the  things  injurious 
to  the  empire.  All  this  has  arisen  from  want  of  mutual  love.  If 
but  that  one  virtue  could  be  made  universal,  the  princes  loving  one 
another  would  have  no  battle-fields;  the  chiefs  of  families  would 
attempt  no  usurpations;  men  would  commit  no  robberies;  rulers 
and  ministers  would  be  gracious  and  loyal ; fathers  and  sons  would 
be  kind  and  filial ; brothers  would  be  harmonious  and  easily  recon- 
ciled. Men  in  general  loving  one  another,  the  strong  would  not 
make  prey  of  the  weak ; the  many  would  not  plunder  the  few ; the 
rich  would  not  insult  the  poor;  the  noble  would  not  be  insolent 
to  the  mean;  and  the  deceitful  would  not  impose  upon  the  simple.” 
' Syllabic  Dictionary,  p.  604. 


282 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


To  bring  about  reform  in  this  direction,  the  princes  and 
governments  should  start  with  a good  example,  when  society 
at  large  will  follow;  and  he  goes  on  to  prove  from  ancient 
history  the  fact,  which  holds  good  for  China  even  at  the 
present  day,  that  the  people  will  readily  fall  in  with  the 
wishes  of  their  rulers,  and  that,  in  other  words,  the  rulers 
have  it  in  their  hands  to  promote  the  universal  love  among 
the  people  if  they  choose  to  set  the  example.* 

Mo  Ti’s  almost  Christian  altruism  was  much  superior  to 
Confucianism,  and  might  have  been  able  to  save  the  em- 
pire had  it  been  quite  so  easy  as  the  philosopher  dreamed 
to  apply  his  theories  to  practical  life.  Not  only  did  the 
states  continue  fighting,  usurping,  and  robbing  one  another, 
but  his  very  colleagues  in  moral  philosophy  tried  to  belittle 
the  value  of  his  unique  doctrine,  chief  among  them  being  the 
great  Confucianist,  Mencius. 

§ 60.  Mencius 

Comparatively  little  is  known  of  the  personal  life  of 
Mencius  {M 6ng  K’o ).  He  was  born  in  372  b.c.,  in  the  little 
state  of  Tsou,  not  far  from  Confucius’s  own  birthplace,  and, 
having  lost  his  father  in  early  childhood,  was  educated 
entirely  by  his  mother,  who,  from  the  many  anecdotes 
circulating  about  her  educational  methods,  has  earned  in 
China  the  reputation  of  a model  mother.  “Mong-mu,” 
“Mother  Mong,”  or  “Mother  of  Mencius,”  is  as  familiar 

' For  further  extracts  and  translations  of  Mo  Ti’s  work,  supposed 
to  have  been  compiled  by  his  disciples  under  the  name  Mo-tzi  in  fif- 
teen books,  see  Legge,  Mencius,  Prolegomena,  p.  104  seqq.;  cf.  also 
Faber,  Die  Grundgedanken  des  alien  chinesischen  Socialismus,  oder  die 
Lehre  des  Philosophen  Micius  (Elberfeld,  1877);  G von  der  Gabelentz, 
Ueber  den  chinesischen  Philosophen  Mek  Tik,  in  Ber.  d.  kgl.  Sachs, 
Ges.  d.  Wissensch.  (1888);  and  W.  Grube,  op.  cit.,  p.  129  seqq. 


THE  CONTENDING  STATES 


283 


a figure  to  the  Chinese  as  the  ‘‘  Mother  of  the  Gracchi  ” was 
to  the  people  of  Rome.  She  changed  her  home  several  times 
because  she  did  not  like  certain  associations  which  seemed 
to  affect  the  education  of  her  little  son.  Thus  she  moved 
away  from  the  neighborhood  of  a cemetery  because  the 
boy  would  mimic  the  mourners  who  came  to  wail  at  the 
tombs.  Then  she  left  a house  near  the  market  because  he 
would  mimic  the  ways  of  shopkeepers.  Finally  she  settled 
near  a school;  and  here  the  boy’s  imitative  talent  was  at 
last  in  its  proper  element.'  With  all  the  authority  exer- 
cised by  her  as  a mother  and  despite  the  great  veneration 
in  which  her  memory  has  at  all  times  been  held  by  the 
Chinese  nation,  it  is  she  who  is  credited  with  the  strongest 
opposition  to  all  female  emancipation.  Once  Mencius 
planned  to  leave  the  state  of  Ts’i  because  its  prince  declined 
to  listen  to  his  gratuitous  advice;  he  hesitated,  however, 
on  account  of  his  old  mother  staying  with  him,  and  when 
he  spoke  to  her  about  this,  she  gave  him  the  following 
reply : — 

“It  is  a woman’s  duty  to  be  skilful  in  the  preparation  of  food 
and  careful  in  the  preservation  of  household  articles ; to  look  after 
the  comfort  of  her  parents-in-law,  and  to  sew  and  weave.  To  these 
things  her  sphere  of  activity  is  limited.  It  is  her  province  to  main- 
tain order  within  the  house ; but  her  thoughts  ought  not  to  wander 
beyond  the  boundaries  of  her  home.  In  the  ‘ Book  of  Changes  ’ it 
is  said : ‘ Let  her  attend  to  the  preparation  of  food  within  the 
rooms  allotted  to  her,  and  take  nothing  else  on  herself.’  And  in 
the  ‘ Book  of  Poetry  ’ it  is  said : ‘ It  is  theirs  neither  to  do  wrong 
nor  to  shine  by  prominent  good  actions ; let  them  limit  their  thoughts 
to  the  wine  and  the  food.’  This  means  that  it  does  not  belong  to 
a woman  to  determine  anything  of  herself,  but  she  is  subject  to  the 

* Arendt,  The  Mother  of  Mencius,  in  China  Review,  vol.  xii,  p.  314 
seqq. 


284 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


rule  of  the  three  obediences.  Therefore,  when  young,  she  has  to 
obey  her  parents;  when  married,  she  has  to  obey  her  husband; 
w'hen  a widow,  she  has  to  obey  her  son.  This  is  her  duty.  At 
present,  you  are  a man  in  your  full  maturity,  and  I am  old.  Do 
you  act  as  your  conviction  of  righteousness  tells  you  you  ought  to 
do,  and  I will  act  according  to  the  rule  which  belongs  to  me.” 

Altogether  she  must  have  been  a very  superior  woman; 
and  it  is  quite  probable  that  the  excellent  education  she 
gave  Mencius  in  his  early  youth  contributed  greatly  to  his 
subsequent  distinction.  After  his  boyhood  nothing  is 
known  of  his  life  until  he  comes  forward  as  a teacher,  or  a 
“professor  of  morals  and  learning,”  as  Legge  puts  it,  some- 
thing like  his  great  prototype  Confucius.  He  was  now 
about  forty  years  of  age  and  surrounded  by  a number  of 
disciples. 

Mencius’s  teachings,  as  laid  down  in  the  book  bearing  his 
name,  are  mainly  of  a political  kind.  During  the  150  years 
W’hich  lay  between  the  times  when  Confucius  and  Mencius 
taught  that  process  of  decay  of  imperial  power,  which 
had  set  in  long  before  the  Ch’un-ts’iu  period,  had  become  a 
continuous  threat  foreboding  general  collapse.  Four  or 
five  generations  earlier  the  princes  of  the  empire  cultivated 
at  least  some  sort  of  nominal  loyalty  toward  the  Son  of 
Heaven.  This  feeling  as  regards  the  legitimacy  of  the 
emperor’s  position,  which  Confucius  had  tried  to  foster  as 
best  he  could,  had  now  given  way  to  utter  disregard  of 
imperial  rights.  Had  the  house  of  Chou  produced  men  of 
action  able  to  assert  themselves  in  this  turmoil  of  mutual 
jealousies  among  the  feudal  states,  there  would  have  been 
room  for  a hero  of  history  to  perform  great  feats;  but  no 
such  man  arose.  The  emperor  was  now  a mere  shadow,  and 
things  took  their  own  course  before  his  eyes.  There  was 


THE  CONTENDING  STATES 


285 


constant  warfare  among  the  princes,  who  would  form  leagues 
against  one  another,  changing  the  equilibrium  of  power 
from  generation  to  generation.  All  these  political  troubles 
were  greatly  augmented  by  the  philosophers’  custom  of 
traveling  about  from  court  to  court  to  tender  advice.  It 
had  become  the  ambition  of  the  learned  classes  to  be  con- 
nected somehow  or  other  with  political  life;  and  the  free- 
dom with  which  it  was  possible  to  leave  one’s  home  in 
order  to  settle  down  in  another  state,  that  Freizugigkeit 
which  in  the  United  States  and  in  modern  Germany  ap- 
pears as  a concession  made  by  local  legislation  to  federal 
power,  probably  had  an  important  share  in  the  general 
decay  which  followed  this  period.  In  those  days  the  fate 
of  China  lay  much  more  in  the  hands  of  irresponsible  ad- 
venturers than  with  the  real  heads  of  the  several  states, 
who  allowed  themselves  to  be  persuaded  by  the  clever 
tongues  of  ambitious  strangers  to  plunge  into  adventures 
most  dangerous  to  themselves  and  to  the  common  welfare. 
These  advisers  had  sometimes  risen  from  the  very  lowest 
ranks  of  the  people;  becoming  adherents  of  one  of  the 
several  philosophic  schools  dominant  at  the  time,  they  made 
use  of  a certain  superiority  in  dialectics  thus  acquired  in 
gratifying  their  ambition  to  rise  to  political  influence. 

Still  it  must  be  admitted  that  among  these  amateur  dip- 
lomats were  men  of  real  importance,  whose  talents  would 
have  shone  had  they  served  a better  purpose  than  that 
of  internal  wars.  Such  are  the  lives  of  Chang  I (died  310 
B.c.)  and  Su  Ts’in  (died  317  b.c.),  who  from  being  servants 
in  a school  picked  up  the  most  necessary  education  in  this 
connection,  then  studied  the  sophistical  art  of  persuading 
any  one  to  anything  under  the  Tauist  philosopher  Kui-ku- 
tzi,  who  prepared  them  for  the  adventurous  career  of  an 


286 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


itinerant  volunteering  diplomat.  Many  of  these  men  were 
devoid  of  all  local  patriotism,  perhaps  because  the  rising 
man  is  so  often  treated  with  contempt  by  his  own  people. 
Thus  Chang  I,  being  a native  of  the  state  of  Wei,  became 
minister  in  Ts’in,  when  through  the  chief  work  of  his  life 
he  did  his  own  country  every  possible  harm,  though,  hav- 
ing to  leave  Ts’in  after  the  death  of  his  patron,  he  accepted 
the  post  of  prime  minister  in  Wei  again.  He  was  one  of 
those  men  of  whom  one  of  Mencius’s  interlocutors  says, 
“ Once  they  are  angry,  the  princes  of  the  empire  will  be 
afraid;  and  when  they  live  quietly,  the  world  will  see  its 
troubles  quelled.”  Altogether  Mencius  tried  to  oppose  the 
current  of  the  times,  in  which  Confucian  tradition  was  en- 
tirely neglected,  with  the  full  weight  of  his  authority,  though 
in  vain.  He  spent  a portion  of  his  life,  some  time  between 
333  and  324  b.c.,  in  the  state  of  Ts’i  as  a counselor  of  the 
prince’s,  for  which  services  he  declined  to  receive  any  salary. 
In  the  conversations  which  he  held  with  the  sovereign  and 
the  government  officers  of  this,  as  of  other  states,  he  has 
placed  on  record  his  views  on  state  management.  These 
views  represent  merely  an  extension  of  the  Confucian 
philosophy  to  the  state  life  in  that  troubled  period  of  the 
Contending  States. 

Mencius  was  a man  of  great  pride;  like  Mahomet,  he 
expected  the  mountain  to  come  to  him  if  he  wanted  it ; 
and  he  never  secured  a footing  of  cordiality  with  the  king 
of  Ts’i,  which,  together  with  the  freedom  he  was  wont  to 
use  in  his  conversations,  led  to  his  withdrawal  from  his 
otherwise  great  admirer.  In  doing  so,  he  was  led  to  hope 
that  the  king  would  recall  him  for  the  benefit  of  the  people 
of  Ts’i,  nay,  for  the  happiness  of  the  whole  empire ; but  the 
mountain  would  not  come  to  him,  and  Mencius  was  no 


THE  CONTENDING  STATES 


287 


Mahomet.  He  then  embraced  the  life  of  a wandering 
philosopher.  In  319  b.c.  he  visited  King  Hui  of  Liang 
in  the  present  K’ai-fong-fu,  to  his  conversation  with  whom 
on  matters  of  government  the  first  of  the  seven  books  of  his 
work  is  devoted.  The  sage’s  conversations  with  sovereigns 
and  statesmen  are  characterized  by  that  spirit  of  expostu- 
lation peculiar  to  philosophical  quibblers;  but,  being  a 
sworn  Confucianist,  he  commands  respect  for  defending 
his  views  against  such  an  overwhelming  opposition  under 
the  conflicting  interests  of  political  and  literary  authorities. 
After  the  death  of  Hui  in  320  b.c.  Mencius  returned  to  Ts’i, 
where  he  held  a court  appointment  and  occasionally  gave 
offense  by  his  overbearing  pride.  MTien  his  aged  mother 
died,  he  buried  her  with  great  pomp,  possibly  to  spite  his 
adversary  Mo  Ti,  who  had  advocated  simplicity  in  funeral 
ceremonies. 

Political  troubles  connected  with  the  conquest  by  Ts’i 
of  the  northern  state  of  Yen,  in  which  Mencius  was  involved, 
led  to  his  adoption  of  a wandering  life  again  (312  b.c.)  ; 
and  after  a stay  of  two  years  in  the  state  of  Sung  he  re- 
turned to  his  native  country,  Lu  (310  b.c.),  where  one  of 
his  disciples  had  been  appointed  prime  minister.  This 
disciple,  named  Yo  Chong,  had  arranged  for  an  interview 
between  him  and  the  reigning  duke ; but  one  of  the  courtiers 
had  thought  it  improper  for  the  latter  to  pay  the  first  visit 
to  a mere  scholar,  and  Mencius,  anxious  though  he  had  been 
all  his  life  to  present  his  theories  on  government  to  those  in 
power,  would  not  again  approach  the  sovereign  voluntarily. 
He  consoled  himself  with  the  thought  that,  though  certain 
men  might  seem  to  be  instrumental  in  fostering  or  hinder- 
ing good  work,  they  could  not  really  interfere  with  its 
progress,  and  that  the  failure  of  the  Duke  of  Lu  to  meet 


288 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


him  was  Heaven’s  decree.  After  this  disappointment, 
which  was  clearly  the  result  of  his  unbending  “Manner- 
stolz,”  he  refrained  from  interviewing  sovereigns  for  the 
rest  of  his  life,  the  last  twenty  years  of  which  he  spent  in 
retirement,  devoted  to  the  company  of  his  disciples  and  to 
literary  work.  He  died  in  289  b.c. 

The  distinctive  merit  of  Mencius’s  philosophy,  as  com- 
pared with  the  teachings  of  Confucius  himself,  is  its  applica- 
tion to  state  life,  starting,  of  course,  in  true  Confucian  spirit 
from  family  relations  and  filial  duty;  but  his  feelings  in  this 
respect  are  essentially  democratic,  the  prosperity  of  the 
people  being  his  first  care,  and  loyalty  to  the  sovereign,  as 
taught  by  Confucius,  being  of  secondary  importance.  It 
was  not  sufficient  for  governments  to  provide  for  the  physical 
welfare  of  the  masses;  it  was  also  their  duty  to  educate 
the  people.  He  despises  power  and  external  grandeur  if 
not  backed  by  justice  and  righteousness;  but  he  is  an 
idealist  and  expects  the  world  to  be  better  than  it  can  ever 
be.  He  does  not  respect  history,  and  books  do  not  inspire 
him  as  infallible.  For  “it  would  be  better  to  have  no 
books  at  all  than  to  believe  everything  they  relate”; 
and  of  the  records  describing  Wu-wang’s  achievements  he 
selected  only  two  or  three  as  trustworthy.'  If  by  these 
“books”  the  Shu-king  is  meant,  it  is  remarkable  that  such 
confessions  should  come  from  a Confucianist  of  Mencius’s 
standing,  who,  moreover,  was  a firm  believer  in  Yau  and 
Shun,  the  model  emperors.  But  it  would  seem  that  his 
antagonism  was  directed  mainly  against  warfare,  about 
which  the  “books”  had  so  much  to  say  and  which  he 
condemned  in  the  strongest  terms,  and  that  he  was  not  so 
much  opposed  to  the  “Book  of  History”  as  to  its  contents, 
‘ Legge,  Mencius,  p.  355. 


THE  CONTENDING  STATES 


289 


which  did  not  condescend  to  prove  his  theories.  Man 
should  and  need  not  fight ; he  ought,  according  to  Mencius, 
to  be  benevolent,  for  "the  benevolent  man  has  no  enemy” 
— that  is  what  a sovereign  should  be.  Those  who  boast 
of  their  skill  in  making  war  are  to  him  great  criminals; 
and  all  the  wars  described  in  the  Ch’un-ts’iu  were  unjust. 
To  King  Hui  of  Liang  he  advises  the  benevolent  administra- 
tion of  government,  by  lenient  punishments,  light  taxa- 
tion, etc.;  thus  he  would  soon  be  backed  by  a people 
who  could  dispense  with  warfare,  being  strong  enough  to 
oppose  the  "strong  mail  and  sharp  weapons”  of  his  en- 
emies, the  troops  of  Ts’in  and  Ch’u,  “with  mere  sticks  in 
their  hands”  * 

Mencius  was  a great  leader  in  questions  of  political 
economy,  which  have  at  all  periods  played  an  important 
part  in  Chinese  political  life.  If  his  ideas  were  not  carried 
out  at  once,  they  were  certainly  of  great  influence  in  later 
centuries.  In  that  mutual  warfare  of  opinions,  when  ad- 
vice on  public  matters  was  so  freely  tendered,  would-be 
reformers  were  to  be  found  everywdiere,  who  tried  to  surpass 
each  other  in  the  originality  of  their  schemes.  Mencius, 
with  all  his  idealism,  at  least  kept  aloof  from  eccentricities. 
Not  only  did  he  steer  a middle  course  between  the  two 
great  antipodes,  Yang  Chu  and  Mo  Ti,  but  he  rebuked 
absurdities  of  every  kind,  such  as  the  hyper-asceticism  of 
Ch’on  Chimg,  who  thought  he  could  purify  his  heart  by 
starvation  and  an  almost  total  neglect  of  the  decencies  of 

* Legge,  Mencius,  p.  11.  Modern  China  will  not  be  able  to  adopt 
this  advice,  and  Kuang-sii  in  his  celebrated  edict  of  June  11,  1898, 
asks  his  nation;  “Shall  we  be  able  to  hold  our  own,  fighting  with 
sticks  against  mailed  armor  and  sharp  weapons,  if  we  continue  to 
neglect  the  drilling  of  our  troops,  the  education  of  our  people  and  the 
development  of  national  resources?” 


u 


290 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


life,  in  which  respect  he  could  vie  with  many  a Buddhist 
self-torturer. 

An  eccentric  of  another  kind  was  “the  agriculturist” 
Hii  King,  who  hailed  from  the  semi-barbarian  state  of 
Ch’u.  He  was  one  of  the  many  peripatetic  philosophers 
who  traveled  from  comt  to  court  hawking  their  theories  of 
good  government,  and  who  had  to  pocket  numerous  dis- 
appointments until  they  found  the  prince  of  some  state, 
however  small,  who  approved  their  ideas.  Such  a petty 
state  was  T’ong,  whose  ruler,  Duke  Won,  had  on  a previous 
occasion  consulted  Mencius  on  that  vexatious  question,  a 
solution  of  which  caused  all  the  little  states  considerable 
anxiety ; namely,  which  of  their  big  neighbors  it  was  most 
desirable  to  side  with  in  order  to  avoid  being  swallowed  up 
themselves.  It  is  not  known  at  how  many  doors  Hii  Hing 
had  knocked  in  vain,  when  he  came  to  Duke  Won’s  gate, 
saying ; “ A man  of  a distant  region,  I have  heard  that  you. 
Prince,  are  practising  a benevolent  government,  and  I wish 
to  obtain  a site  for  a house,  and  to  become  one  of  your 
people” ; and  the  duke  gave  him  a dwelling-place.  His  dis- 
ciples, numbering  some  dozens,  wore  clothes  of  hair-cloth 
and  made  sandals  of  hemp  and  wove  mats  for  a living. 

Hii  Hing’s  theory  was  that  the  cultivation  of  the  soil  was 
the  only  source  of  the  true  welfare  of  the  people.  In  this 
he  clashed  with  the  views  of  Mencius,  who  proved  in  detail 
that  Hii  Hing’s  were  fallacious.  Hii  Hing  had  expected 
sovereigns  to  cultivate  the  ground  and  eat  of  the  fruit  of 
their  labor  like  ordinary  peasants.  “They  should  prepare 
their  own  meals  morning  and  evening,  while  at  the  same 
time  carrying  on  their  government.”  The  granaries, 
treasuries,  and  arsenals  kept  by  princes  were  merely  a 
burden  on  the  people.  To  these  arguments  Mencius  re- 


THE  CONTENDING  STATES 


291 


plied : " I suppose  that  Hii  King  sows  grain  and  eats  the 
produce.  Does  he  also  weave  cloth  ? ” “ No ; for  he  wears 
hair-cloth.”  “And  his  cap?”  “He  gets  it  in  exchange  for 
grain.”  “And  the  food-boilers  and  earthenware  pans  re- 
quired for  cooking  his  food,  and  the  iron  share  used  for 
ploughing?”  “He  gets  them  all  in  exchange  for  grain.” 
It  was  by  such  questions  that  Mencius,  like  most  of  the  old 
Chinese  philosophers,  tried  to  prove  his  point,  — the 
erotetic  method  by  which  Socrates  used  to  demonstrate 
his  reductio  ad  absurdum.  Having  thus  elicited  from  the 
defender  of  Hii  Hing’s  theories  all  their  absurdities,  he 
developed  his  own  system  of  political  economy,  which  went 
to  show  that  husbandry  cannot  be  the  only  basis  of  good 
government  and  that  industry  claims  its  rights ; also,  that 
some  men  labor  with  their  minds,  while  others  labor  with 
their  bodily  strength;  mind  laborers  being  the  govern- 
ment class,  and  physical  laborers  those  that  are  governed 
by  others.  Dr.  W.  E.  Macklin,  in  an  interesting  paper  on 
Mencius,'  remarks  in  connection  with  this  anecdote:  — 

“Tolstoi  edited  a book  written  by  a leveler  like  Hii  Hing,  who 
taught  that  every  one  should  raise  his  own  grain.  I forget  the  jaw- 
breaking Russian  name  of  the  writer.  If  Tolstoi  had  not  already 
been  converted  from  the  error  of  his  ways,  Mencius  could  turn  him. 
We  see  from  this  that  Mencius  is  no  crank  with  a wheel  or  twist  in 
his  brain.” 

Among  the  many  philosophers  who  from  the  days  of 
Confucius  down  to  the  end  of  the  Chou  dynasty  helped  to 
raise  decadent  China  to  such  a high  intellectual  standard 
Mencius  impresses  us  as  the  clearest  in  judgment.  He  is 
certainly  not  a mystic;  and  in  common-sense  argumenta- 

' Mencius  and  Some  Other  Reformers  of  China,  in  Journal  of  the 
China  Branch  of  the  Royal  Asiatic  Society,  vol.  xxxiii. 


292 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


tion,  by  which  he  tries  to  sift  his  problems  to  the  bottom, 
his  work  contrasts  favorably  with  the  Tau-td-king.  Chinese 
philosophers  do  not  present  their  teachings  in  the  shape  of 
regular  “systems”;  but  how  a system  can  be  constructed 
out  of  a work  which  at  first  sight  appears  as  an  incoherent  ac- 
count of  anecdotes  and  a series  of  dialogues  reproducing  the 
sage’s  remarks  on  all  possible  details  of  individual,  family, 
and  official  life,  has  been  well  shown  in  Dr.  Ernst  Faber’s 
German  book  on  Mencius.*  It  is  perhaps  characteristic, 
and  a testimony  to  his  common  sense,  that  Mencius  does 
not  share  with  his  great  master  Confucius  the  esteem  in 
which  the  latter  held  the  I-king,  or  “Book  of  Changes,” 
if  we  may  draw  conclusions  from  the  fact  that  he  never 
referred  to  it.  A glance  at  Faber’s  digest  shows  that  his 
“Mencius”  covers  a wide  range  of  philosophic  thought,  but 
that  man  in  all  his  relations  is  its  chief  concern.  In  this 
respect  he  goes  much  more  into  detail  even  than  Confucius, 
and  when  compared  with  him,  his  detail  is  characterized 
by  a certain  moderation  in  accepting  the  observance  of 
outer  formalities. 

All  the  important  phases  of  Chinese  social  and  official  life 
are  discussed  in  the  book,  which,  moreover,  appeals  to  the 
sympathy  of  all  those  among  us  whose  principle  of  life 
is  that  never  ending  self-education  of  character.  In 
this  respect  Mencius  may  be  considered  a model.  We 
have,  it  is  true,  to  make  allowance  for  his  being  a Chinese 
and  for  the  remoteness  of  the  period  in  which  he  lived,  but 
not  nearly  to  the  same  extent  as  in  the  case  of  Confucius. 

* “ Eine  Staatslehre  auf  ethischer  Grundlage,  oder  Lehrbegriff  des 
chinesischen  Philosophen  Mencius’’  Elberfeld,  1877.  The  author 
does  not  in  all  his  translations  and  interpretations  agree  with  Legge, 
whose  volume  on  Mencius  {The  Chinese  Classics,  vol.  ii)  appeared  in 
1861. 


THE  CONTENDING  STATES 


293 


Further,  considerably  more  of  the  disciple’s  thought  than 
of  that  of  the  master  himself  seems  to  have  retained  its 
eternal  value.  Benevolence  and  justice  are  the  great  vir- 
tues which  should  govern  man’s  actions  in  all  his  relations ; 
of  these  relations  the  most  important  is  that  between 
sovereign  and  people ; and  sovereigns  should  cultivate  these 
virtues  in  the  first  instance.  Many  of  the  sage’s  sayings 
may,  therefore,  be  said  to  come  under  that  chapter,  so  much 
cultivated  by  Oriental  philosophers,  of  “Mirror  of  Princes.” 
But  that  in  which  all  are  concerned,  the  great  lesson  he 
gives  to  humanity  at  large,  is  the  education  of  one’s  per- 
sonal character.  Character  is  more  important  than  clever- 
ness. Man’s  life  ought  to  be  a constant  strife  in  subduing 
one’s  passions,  in  order  to  attain  to  perfection  by  the 
dominancy  of  ethical  principles  and  the  suppression  of 
sensual  instincts;  and  all  this  striving  for  perfection  should 
not  be  undertaken  for  the  sake  of  external  rewards,  but  for 
the  pleasure  one  takes  in  perfection  itself.  It  does  Dr. 
Faber,  the  missionary,  as  much  credit  as  it  does  the  ancient 
sage  that,  far  from  condemning  these  views  as  pagan,  he 
regards  them  as  an  incentive  to  Christians  to  vie  with 
heathen  characters  in  the  exercise  of  virtue.  The  Chinese, 
he  thinks,  are  now  as  far  away  from  these  ideals  as  they 
were  in  the  time  of  Mencius,  whose  teachings  represent, 
as  it  were,  the  conscience  of  the  Chinese,  — the  knowledge 
of  what  is  normal  in  goodness,  by  which  the  deviations  of 
individual  life  may  be  judged. 

In  his  political  views  Mencius  was  decidedly  loyal  to  the 
traditional  position  of  the  Chou  emperor ; and  he  denounced 
the  decadence  of  his  age  as  being  the  result  of  the  neglect 
of  loyalty.  The  “Five  Leaders”  {wu-pa,  seventh  century 
B.c.)  offended  in  loyalty  against  the  “Three  Kings”  (san- 


294 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


wang,  i.e.  the  founders  of  the  three  dynasties  Hia,  Shang, 
and  Chou).  This  means  they  were  the  first  to  disavow 
openly  imperial  authority.  Then  he  says:  '‘The  princes 
of  the  present  day  offend  in  loyalty  against  the  Five  Lead- 
ers, and  the  great  officers  of  the  present  day  offend  in  loyalty 
against  the  princes.”  He  laments  the  position  of  the  em- 
peror, who  formerly  visited  the  princes  on  tours  of  inspec- 
tion and  received  at  his  court  visits  from  the  princes  who 
reported  to  him  on  their  official  acts.  It  used  to  be  a 
custom  in  the  spring  to  examine  the  ploughing  and  to  supply 
any  deficiency  of  seed ; in  autumn,  to  examine  the  reaping 
and  to  assist  where  there  was  a deficiency  in  the  crop. 
When  the  emperor  entered  the  boundaries  of  a state,  if 
new  ground  was  being  reclaimed  and  the  old  fields  were 
well  cultivated,  if  the  aged  were  nourished  and  the  worthy 
honored,  and  if  men  of  distinguished  talents  were  placed  in 
office,  the  prince  was  rewarded  by  the  emperor  with  an 
addition  to  his  territory.  On  the  other  hand,  if  the  em- 
peror found  that  the  ground  was  left  wild  or  overrun  with 
weeds,  if  the  old  were  neglected  and  the  worthy  unhonored, 
and  if  the  offices  were  filled  with  hard  tax-gatherers,  the 
prince  was  reprimanded  by  the  emperor.  Non-attendance 
at  court  was  visited  by  degradation  of  rank,  loss  of  terri- 
tory, and,  if  persisted  in,  by  removal  from  government. 
The  emperor  merely  used  his  authority  in  commanding 
such  punishments,  the  execution  of  which  rested  with  the 
other  princes.  It  was  only  through  the  rule  of  the  Five 
Leaders  that  the  time-honored  imperial  privilege  passed 
out  of  the  hands  of  the  Son  of  Heaven  into  those  of  the 
Leaders.  This  was,  according  to  Mencius,  an  offense  in 
loyalty  against  the  Three  Kings.  Tlie  period  of  the  Five 
Leaders  thus  marks,  according  to  him,  the  first  stage  of 


THE  CONTENDING  STATES 


295 


that  decay  of  imperial  power  which  had  ruled  supreme  for 
a thousand  years  and  more. 

The  most  powerful  of  the  Five  Leaders,  Duke  Huan  of 
Ts’i,  as  we  have  already  seen,  called  a covenant  of  the 
princes  of  the  empire  in  which  five  articles  were  agreed 
upon  for  the  guidance  of  the  several  sovereigns.  The 
fifth  article  says:  “Make  no  promotions  without  first 
announcing  them  to  the  king,  or  emperor.”  This  involves 
at  least  a certain  amount  of  loyalty  to  the  central  power,  if 
merely  a nominal  one;  but,  as  Mencius  continues,  the 
princes  of  his  time  all  violated  the  prohibitions  contained 
in  these  five  articles,  for  which  reason  he  held  them  to 
offend  in  loyalty  against  the  Five  Leaders.  Mencius 
contrasts  the  disloyalty  of  a man  who  merely  follows  his 
sovereign  in  a wicked  enterprise  with  that  of  the  man  who 
instigates  him  to  wickedness.  Tliis  was,  indeed,  the  great 
crime  of  the  high  officers  of  his  own  time,  who  offended  in 
disloyalty  to  their  sovereigns.'  Altogether  we  could  not 
find  any  better  exponent  of  the  gradual  collapse  of  that 
once  glorious  Chou  dynasty  than  the  philosopher  Mencius. 

The  history  of  the  state  of  Ts’i  has  shown  how  in  ancient 
China  the  application  of  scholarship  to  the  affairs  of  govern- 
ment bore  practical  fruit,  and  there  has  probably  been  no 
second  example  on  record  in  which  the  results  of  philo- 
sophic thought  were  so  immediately  and  successfully  con- 
nected with  state  management  as  that  of  the  philosopher 
Kuan-tzi.  After  him  Confucius  strove  in  vain  to  gain 
personal  influence  in  matters  of  government.  If  he  did 
not  succeed,  some  of  his  disciples  did,  besides  hundreds  of 
influential  men  who  in  later  generations  educated  them- 
selves by  the  study  of  his  teachings.  Something  similar 
* Legge,  op.  cit.,  pp.  311-314. 


296 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


was  eminently  the  case  with  the  great  Confucianist  Mencius 
who  devoted  a good  deal  of  thought  to  questions  of  political 
economy  and  to  politics  generally.  He  advocated  tutelage 
over  the  people,  though  on  liberal  principles.  One  of  his 
pet  theories  was  the  division  of  fields  among  the  population. 
According  to  him,  the  expenses  of  government  ought  to  be 
raised  by  levying  the  tenth  part  of  all  land  cultivated  by 
the  people  on  government  account.  For  this  purpose  he 
recommended  the  tsing,  or  “well,”  sys- 
tem of  tithing,  by  which  all  land  was 
to  be  divided  into  equal  squares  of  so 

many  acres,  each  square  being  separated 

from  its  neighbor  by  boundary  lines  re- 
sembling  the  shape  of  the  Chinese  char- 


acter tsing 


(“well”)  so  as  to  yield  nine  square  lots. 


Of  these  the  eight  outer  ones  were  to  be  held  by  private 
owners  among  the  people,  who  by  their  joint  labor  were 
to  cultivate  the  central  lot  for  the  government.  This  was, 
of  course,  a utopianism  but  little  better  than  Hii  King’s 
agricultural  eccentricities;  and  it  is  difficult  to  imagine 
how  in  the  long  run  it  could  work  successfully  in  practice. 
Still  the  tsing  system  has  again  and  again  been  considered 
in  the  course  of  history  as  having  been  favored  by  such 
a deep  thinker  as  Mencius  and,  with  its  claim  of  certain 
lands  for  government  use,  may  have  actually  influenced 
the  laying  out  of  city  plans  and  field-marks. 

The  question  how  to  defray  the  expenses  of  government 
has,  of  course,  occupied  the  sovereigns  of  China  at  all 
periods  of  its  history,  and  when  Mencius  devoted  his  atten- 
tion to  the  subject,  several  systems  of  taxation  had  already 


THE  CONTENDING  STATES 


297 


been  tried ; but,  with  that  complexity  which  has  at  all  times 
prevailed  in  the  sources  of  revenue,  it  seems  natural  that 
in  ancient  China,  at  a time  when  foreign  trade  was  still 
inconsiderable  and  agriculture  was  by  far  the  most  im- 
portant basis  of  public  wealth,  the  taxation  of  land  {fu) 
and  personal  services  (f)  should  form  the  backbone  of 
taxation.  From  the  earliest  existence  of  a government  in 
China,  land  has  been  considered  to  be  the  property  of  the 
sovereign.  There  was  no  private  ownership,  but  subjects 
were  allowed  to  claim  lots  on  payment  of  a tax,  which  con- 
sisted in  the  surrendering  of  a certain  percentage  of  the 
harvest.  This  percentage  has,  of  course,  varied  a good  deal 
in  the  course  of  history.  At  first  calculated  on  the  mere 
area  held  by  farmers,  it  is  stated  to  have  been  levied  accord- 
ing to  the  nature  of  the  land  as  early  as  the  Emperor  Yau 
(2300  B.C.).  The  Emperor  Yii  (2200  b.c.)  is  supposed  to 
have  introduced  the  so-called  tribute  system  (kung-fa),  by 
which  fifty  m6u,  or  acres,  were  granted  to  each  adult,  the 
corresponding  tribute  being  one-tenth  of  the  produce  of  the 
land.  Ch’ong-t’ang,  founder  of  the  Shang  dynasty  (1766 
B.C.),  is  supposed  to  have  been  the  originator  of  a mutual 
aid  system  (tsu-fa),  which  the  philosopher  Chu  Hi  believes 
to  have  been  the  foundation  of  the  tsing  system  remodeled 
by  Mencius,  ’and  by  which  a tsing  was  divided  into  nine 
squares,  each  measuring  70  m6u.  By  this  system  the 
ground  tax  would  seem  at  first  sight  to  have  been  one- 
ninth  of  the  produce;  but  since  the  farmers  had  to  live  in 
houses  occupying  certain  portions  of  their  lots,  it  may  be 
said  that  practically  the  government  tax  amounted  to  that 
prototype  of  all  ancient  taxation,  the  tithe.  At  the  begin- 
ning of  the  Chou  dynasty  (1122  b.c.)  a combination  of  the 
two  older  systems  was  resorted  to,  householders  in  cities 


298 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


and  towns  paying  their  tithe  in  kind  on  the  land  belonging 
to  them,  whereas  the  mutual  aid  system  remained  in  force 
in  the  rural  districts.  This  arrangement  was  known  as 
the  “share  system”  (ch’6-}a)  and  prevailed  during  the 
greater  part  of  the  Chou  dynasty.  Under  it  a certain 
percentage  of  the  land  held  by  farmers  was  allowed  for 
buildings,  and  of  the  remainder,  as  ground  under  actual 
cultivation,  the  tenth  portion  of  the  crops,  i.e.  the  tithe,  was 
due  to  the  government. 

All  through  the  Chou  dynasty  the  principle  by  which  land 
was  held  was  that  the  sovereign,  whoever  he  might  be,  was 
in  all  cases  the  real  owner  and  that  the  tenant  held  it  under 
conditions  determined  by  the  government.  Man  was  held 
to  be  an  adult  at  the  age  of  twenty,  and  his  portion  of  land 
was  then  allotted  to  him;  at  the  age  of  sixty  his  fields 
reverted  to  the  government ; and  no  sale  or  other  disposal 
was  permitted.  This  system  was  not  changed  under  the 
feudal  government  by  which  so  many  kings,  dukes,  mar- 
quises, counts,  and  barons  were  sovereigns  and  consequently 
owners  of  all  the  soil  within  their  respective  dominions  — 
under  the  more  or  less  doubtful  authority  of  the  Son  of 
Heaven.  The  laws  of  land-ownership  experienced  a 
thorough  change  on  the  establishment  of  the  new  empire 
under  Shi-huang-ti,  when,  for  the  first  time  in  the  history 
of  China,  occupants  hitherto  treated  as  mere  landholders 
became  virtual  proprietors  and  when  important  changes 
took  place  in  the  levy  of  the  ground  tax.‘ 

' I.  M.  Daae,  The  Landtax  in  China.  A description  of  its  origin 
and  development  together  with  the  nature  and  incidences  of  the  present 
levy.  Collected  from  the  most  reliable  Chinese  sources.  In  Transactions 
of  the  VIII  International  Congress  of  Orientalists,  Stockholm,  1889,  pt. 
iv,  pp.  53-86.  I differ  from  Mr.  Daae  in  the  translation  of  the  term 
shi-i,  lit.,  “ten  and  one,”  which  here  does  not  mean  eleven  parts,  but 


THE  CONTENDING  STATES 


299 


§ 61.  Chuang-tzi 

As  Mencius  was  the  principal  representative  of  the  Con- 
fucian  school  of  philosophers,  so  Chuang-tzi,  his  contempo- 
rary, was  the  chief  representative  of  Tauist  philosophy. 
Chuang-tzi’s  views  thus  formed  the  greatest  contrast  of 
everything  preached  by  the  Confucianists ; and  this  contrast 
may  be  shown  even  in  his  personal  life.  Whereas  Confucius 
and  Mencius  constantly  hankered  after  personal  influence 
with  princes  and  governments,  their  great  ambition  being 
to  be  social  reformers,  Chuang-tzi  was  the  better  philoso- 
pher inasmuch  as  he  cared  more  for  the  absolute  liberty 
of  a scholar’s  life  than  for  a grand  position  in  the  world. 
Twice  he  declined  the  honor  of  being  prime  minister  to  the 
king  of  Ch’u.  He  compared  the  man  who  held  such  a posi- 
tion and  who  could  at  any  time  fall  into  disgrace  to  “the 
sacrificial  ox  fattened  for  years  in  order  to  be  led  to  the 
altar,  decked  with  embroidered  trappings,  and  killed.” 
On  another  occasion,  when  the  king  had  offered  him  that 
same  high  position,  he  referred  to  “a  sacred  tortoise  which 
had  been  dead  for  some  three  thousand  years,  but  was  held 
in  reverential  memory  on  the  altar  of  the  king’s  ancestral 
temple.”  “Would  not  this  tortoise,”  he  asked  the  king, 
“rather  than  seeing  its  dead  remains  worshiped,  prefer  to 
be  alive  and  wag  its  tail  in  the  mud?”  The  philosopher 
preferred  to  “wag  his  tail  in  the  mud”  rather  than  be  a 
grand  personage  and  be  practically  dead.  If  Mencius  may 
be  said  to  be  a better  exponent  of  Confucian  teachings  than 

“one  out  of  ten,”  i.e.  the  tithe.  Cf.  also  A.  Forke,  Das  chinesische 
Finanz-  und  Steuerwesen,  in  Mittheilungen  des  Seminars  fiir  Oriental- 
ische  Sprachen  zu  Berlin,  Jahrgang  iii,  1900,  pt.  i,  p.  167  seqq. 


300 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


Confucius  himself,  owing  to  the  simplicity  and  clearness  of 
his  language,  something  similar  is  the  case  with  Chuang-tzi 
as  an  exponent  of  Lau-tzi’s  Tauist  wisdom,  whose  work  (if 
it  is  his  indeed),  the  Tau-to-king,  is  a good  deal  more  in 
need  of  a commentary  than  the  sayings  of  Confucius.  We 
possess  an  excellent  translation  of  Chuang-tzi’s  writings  by 
Professor  Herbert  A.  Giles,*  whose  skepticism  concerning 
Lautzi’s  Tau-to-king  seems  to  qualify  him  especially  as 
a spokesman  on  Chuang-tzi.  Mr.  Giles  says  in  his  intro- 
duction : — 

“Lau-tzi  was  the  great  Prophet  of  his  age.  He  taught  men  to 
return  good  for  evil,  and  to  look  forward  to  a higher  life.  He  professed 
to  have  found  the  clue  to  all  things  human  and  divine. 

“ He  seems  to  have  insisted  that  his  system  could  not  be  reduced 
to  words.  At  any  rate,  he  declared  that  those  who  spoke  did  not 
know,  while  those  who  knew  did  not  speak. 

“But  to  accommodate  himself  to  conditions  of  mortality,  he 
called  this  clue  TAU,  or  THE  WAY,  explaining  that  the  word  was 
to  be  understood  metaphorically,  and  not  in  a literal  sense  as  the 
way  or  road  upon  which  men  walk. 

“The  following  are  sentences  selected  from  the  indusputably 
genuine  remains  of  Lau-tzi,  to  be  found  scattered  here  and  there 
in  early  Chinese  literature : 

All  the  world  knows  that  the  goodness  of  doing  good  is  not  real  goodness. 

When  merit  has  been  achieved,  do  not  take  it  to  yourself.  On  the  other  hand 
if  you  do  not  take  it  to  yourself,  it  shall  never  be  taken  from  you. 

By  many  words  wit  is  exhausted.  It  is  better  to  preserve  a mean. 

Keep  behind  and  you  shall  be  put  in  front.  Keep  out  and  you  shall  be  kept  in. 

What  the  world  reverences  may  not  be  treated  with  irreverence. 

Good  words  shall  gain  you  honor  in  the  market-place.  Good  deeds  shall  gain 
you  friends  among  men. 

He  who,  conscious  of  being  strong,  is  content  to  be  weak,  he  shall  be  a cynosure 
of  men. 

The  empire  is  a divine  trust,  and  may  not  be  ruled.  He  who  rules,  ruins.  He 
who  holds  by  force,  loses. 

Mighty  is  he  who  conquers  himself. 

‘ Chuang-tzl,  Mystic,  Moralist  and  Social  Reformer,  translated  from 
the  Chinese.  London,  1889. 


THE  CONTENDING  STATES 


301 


He  who  is  content  has  enough. 

To  the  good  I would  be  good.  To  the  not  good  I would  also  be  good,  in  order 
to  make  them  good. 

If  the  government  is  tolerant,  the  people  will  be  without  guile.  If  the  govern- 
ment is  meddling,  there  will  be  constant  infraction  of  the  law. 

Recompense  injury  with  kindness. 

The  wise  man’s  freedom  from  grievance  is  because  he  will  not  regard  grievances 
as  such. 

“Of  such  were  the  pure  and  simple  teachings  of  Lau-tzi.  But 
it  is  upon  the  wondrous  doctrine  of  Inaction  that  his  claim  to  im- 
mortality is  founded ; 

Do  nothing,  and  all  things  will  be  done. 

I do  nothing,  and  my  people  become  good  of  their  own  accord. 

Abandon  wisdom  and  discard  knowledge,  and  the  people  will  be  benefited  an 
hundredfold. 

The  weak  overcomes  the  strong,  the  soft  overcomes  the  hard.  All  the  world 
knows  this;  yet,  none  can  act  up  to  it. 

The  softest  things  in  the  world  override  the  hardest.  That  which  has  no  substance 
enters  where  there  is  no  fissure.  And  so  I know  that  there  is  advantage  in  Inaction. 

“Such  doctrines  as  these  were,  however,  not  likely  to  appeal 
with  force  to  the  sympathies  of  a practical  people.  In  the  sixth 
century  b.c.,  before  Lau-tzi’s  death,  another  prophet  arose.  He 
taught  his  countrymen  that  duty  to  one’s  neighbor  comprises  the 
whole  duty  of  man.  Charitableness  of  heart,  justice,  sincerity,  and 
fortitude,  sum  up  the  ethics  of  Confucius.  He  knew  nothing  of  a 
God,  of  a soul,  of  an  unseen  world.  And  he  declared  that  the  un- 
knowable had  better  remain  untouched. 

“Against  these  hard  and  worldly  utterances,  Chuang-tzi  raised 
a powerful  cry.  The  idealism  of  Lau-tzi  had  seized  upon  his 
poetic  soul,  and  he  determined  to  stem  the  tide  of  materialism  in 
which  men  were  being  fast  rolled  to  perdition. 

“He  failed,  of  course.  It  was,  indeed,  too  great  a task  to  per- 
suade the  calculating  Chinese  nation  that  by  doing  nothing  all 
things  would  be  done.  But  Chuang-tzi  bequeathed  to  posterity 
a work  which,  by  reason  of  its  marvelous  literary  beauty,  has  al- 
ways held  a foremost  place.  It  is  also  a work  of  much  originality 
of  thought.  The  writer,  it  is  true,  appears  chiefly  as  a disciple 
insisting  upon  the  principles  of  a master.  But  he  has  contrived  to 
extend  the  field,  and  carry  his  own  speculations  into  regions  never 
dreamt  of  by  Lau-tzi.” 


302 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


Chuang-tzi’s  works  are  full  of  acrimonious  attacks  on 
Confucius  and  his  school.  That  antagonism  between 
Confucianists  and  Tauists,  which  in  later  centuries  divided 
the  Chinese  world  of  thought  into  two  hostile  camps,  had 
begun  to  take  positive  shape  among  the  philosophers  of  the 
Contending  States.  Confucius  and  his  adherents  were 
treated  with  ironical  contempt.  In  those  days  he  was  not 
half  so  great  a man  among  the  Chinese  as  he  became  in  later 
centuries  after  the  apotheoses  of  such  influential  writers  as 
Han  Yii  (768-824)  and  Chu  Hi  (1130-1200);  and  to  ex- 
pose him  to  the  ridicule  of  the  masses  all  possible  dia- 
lectic artifices  were  resorted  to  by  his  adversaries,  not  the 
least  powerful  among  whom  was  Chuang-tzi. 

One  of  the  best-known  attacks  on  Confucius  is  that  mas- 
terful literary  caricature,  forming  the  spurious  twenty- 
ninth  chapter  of  Chuang-tzi’s  work,  containing  the  story  of 
“ Robber  Chi.”  Chi,  a fictitious  Bill  Sykes,  was  at  the  head 
of  a band  of  nine  thousand  ill-reputed  characters  and  be- 
came a regular  scourge  to  the  empire.  This  was  an  eyesore 
to  Confucius,  who  determined  to  use  his  eloquence  in  trying 
to  persuade  him  that  virtue  is  better  than  vice.  When  the 
robber  was  advised  of  the  sage’s  visit,  he  flew  into  a rage 
and  at  first  would  not  see  him,  calling  him  evil  names ; but 
finally  he  admitted  him  into  his  presence.  The  conversa- 
tion which  ensued  forms  a satire  on  the  life  and  teachings  of 
Confucius  which,  better  than  anything  else,  was  apt  to 
predispose  the  masses  against  him,  the  great  robber  scourg- 
ing him  with  the  merciless  lash  of  his  irony.  “You  wear 
patched  clothes  and  a narrow  girdle,”  he  tells  Confucius; 
“you  talk  big  and  act  falsely,  in  order  to  deceive  the  rulers 
of  the  land,  while  all  the  time  you  yourself  are  aiming  at 
wealth  and  power  ! You  are  the  biggest  thief  I know ; and 


THE  CONTENDING  STATES 


303 


if  the  world  calls  me  ‘Robber  Chi/  it  most  certainly  ought 
to  call  you  ‘ Robber’  Confucius.”  And  among  other  things 
he  says : “You  call  yourself  a man  of  talent  and  a sage,  for- 
sooth ! Twice  you  have  been  driven  out  of  Lu.  You  were 
tabooed  in  Wei.  You  were  a failure  in  Ts’i.  In  fact,  the 
empire  won’t  have  you  anywhere.  It  was  yom-  teaching 
which  brought  Tzi-lu  to  his  tragical  end.  You  cannot  take 
care,  in  the  first  place,  of  yourself,  nor,  in  the  second  place,  of 
others.  Of  what  value  can  your  doctrine  be  ?” 

Then  he  goes  on  to  prove  the  fallacy  of  a number  of  the 
most  cherished  traditions  of  Chinese  history.  All  the  heroes 
of  high  antiquity,  such  as  Huang-ti,  Yau,  Shun,  Yii,  Ch’ong- 
t’ang,  Won-wang,  and  Wu-wang,  had  their  flaws.  Whatever 
their  reputation  among  men  may  be,  “fuller  investigation 
shows  that  a desire  for  advantage  disturbed  their  original 
purity  and  forced  it  into  a contrary  direction;  hence  the 
shamelessness  of  their  deeds.”  Having  emphasized  some 
of  the  views  known  from  other  books  to  be  those  of  the 
philosopher  Yang  Chu  (one  of  the  several  anachronisms 
stamping  this  entire  chapter  as  spurious),  he  winds  up  by 
saying : — 

“ ‘ Confucius ! all  your  teachings  are  nothing  to  me.  Begone ! 
Go  home ! Say  no  more  ! Your  doctrine  is  a random  jargon,  full 
of  falsity  and  deceit.  It  can  never  preserve  the  original  purity  of 
man.  Why  discuss  it  further  ? ' 

“Confucius  made  two  obeisances  and  hurriedly  took  his  leave. 
On  mounting  his  chariot,  he  three  times  missed  hold  of  the  reins. 
His  eyes  were  so  dazed  that  he  could  see  nothing.  His  face  was 
ashy  pale.  With  downcast  head  he  grasped  the  bar  of  his  chariot, 
unable  to  find  vent  for  his  feelings.”  ‘ 

The  story  of  Robber  Chi  is  one  of  those  allegorical  fictions 
made  use  of  by  the  contending  philosophers  of  the  Contend- 
* Giles,  op.  cU.,  pp.  387-406. 


304 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


ing  States  as  the  most  impressive  weapon  in  that  spiritual 
contest  now  raging  between  the  adherents  of  Lau-tzi  and 
Confucius.  In  one  of  the  spurious  chapters  appearing 
in  the  works  of  Chuang-tzi/  Confucius  is  introduced  in 
conversation  with  a mysterious  sage  approaching  him  in 
the  disguise  of  a simple-minded  old  fisherman  with  beard 
and  eyebrows  snowy  white.  Among  other  unpalatable 
truths  Confucius  has  to  hear  from  his  lips  is  the  following 
parable,  describing  his  vain  attempts  to  gain  a position 
in  reforming  the  world,  thus  never  conquering  that  philo- 
sophical calmness  he  might  have  enjoyed  had  he  left  others 
alone  and  cultivated  his  own  physical  and  mental  self  in 
accordance  with  Lau-tzi’s  principle  of  inaction : — 

“There  was  once  a man  who  was  so  afraid  of  his  shadow  and  so 
di.sliked  his  own  footsteps  that  he  determined  to  run  away  from 
them.  But  the  oftener  he  raised  his  feet  the  more  footsteps  he 
made,  and  though  he  ran  very  hard,  his  shadow  never  left  him. 
From  this  he  inferred  that  he  went  too  slowly,  and  ran  as  hard  as 
he  could  without  resting,  the  consequence  being  that  his  strength 
broke  down  and  he  died.  He  was  not  aware  that  by  going  into  the 
shade  he  would  have  got  rid  of  his  shadow,  and  that  by  keeping 
still  he  would  have  put  an  end  to  his  footsteps.  Fool  that  he  was ! ” 

The  old  fisherman  appears  to  hit  the  nail  on  the  head  by 
vituperating  the  Confucian  mania  for  external  ceremonies. 
'‘Real  mourning  grieves  in  silence.”  “Our  emotions  are 
dependent  upon  the  original  purity  within,  and  it  matters 
not  what  ceremonies  may  be  employed.”  “Ceremonial  is 
the  invention  of  man.  Our  original  purity  is  given  to  us 
from  God.”  “The  true  sage  should  model  himself  upon 
God  and  hold  his  original  purity  in  esteem;  he  should  be 
independent  of  human  exigencies.  Fools,  however,  reverse 
* Giles,  op.  cit.,  pp.  413-422. 


THE  CONTENDING  STATES 


305 


this.”  Such  a fool,  we  read  between  the  lines,  was  Con- 
fucius, who  in  this  fictitious  tale  is  represented  as  almost 
a convert  to  Tauism,  — a mere  satire  and  a mild  literary 
fraud  which,  like  many  others,  has  probably  done  a good 
deal  to  undermine  that  authority  of  Confucian  teachings, 
which  after  all  must  be  considered  as  the  cement,  so  to 
speak,  that  had  so  far  prevented  the  utter  collapse  of  the 
Chou  dynasty. 


§ 62.  Minor  Philosophers 

The  age  of  Mencius  and  Chuang-tzi  and  the  generations 
following  them  down  to  the  earlier  Han  dynasty  produced 
quite  a number  of  minor  philosophers  whose  teachings 
have  been  handed  down  in  texts  not  always  beyond  sus- 
picion as  to  genuineness  and  authorship.  These  texts  were 
copied  and  recopied  during  the  Middle  Ages,  and  have  been 
published  in  countless  editions  since  the  development  of 
the  book-printing  industry;  and  they  have  all  found  their 
commentators,  defenders,  and  adversaries.  Apart  from 
the  Confucian  classics,  the  recognition  of  the  several  texts 
of  which,  as  canonical  books,  has  varied  a good  deal  in  the 
course  of  history,  the  Tau-to-king  and  the  several  minor 
philosophers  have  been  reprinted  in  numerous  series,  the 
selection  of  texts  varying  according  to  the  tastes  of  their 
publishers.  Thus  we  have  series  reproducing  the  texts  of 
5,  6,  10,  20,  or  22  philosophers,  and  many  of  these  texts 
have  been  inserted  here  and  there  in  collections  of  reprints 
not  exclusively  devoted  to  philosophical  literature. 

During  the  Ming  dynasty,  about  1600  a.d.,  an  edition  of 
philosophical  works  appeared  under  the  title  Sien-ts’in- 
chu-tzi-ho-pien,  which  means  “Complete  Edition  of  the 


306 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


Philosophers  that  lived  prior  to  the  Ts’in  Dynasty.”  This 
is  the  period  interesting  us  at  present.  The  minor  philoso- 
phers — it  is  merely  their  texts  that  are  included  in  the 
series — are  there  divided  into  Confucianists,  Tauists, 
writers  on  government,  Mihists  (adherents  of  Mo  Ti,  the 
philosopher  of  universal  love),  “criss-cross  philosophers,” 
i.e.  those  who  teach  the  dialectic  art  of  defending  opposite 
views  in  politics,  and  miscellaneous  celebrities.  This  classi- 
fication has  been  adopted  in  imitation  of  the  division  of 
philosophical  writers  first  applied  to  the  imperial  library 
of  the  Sui  dynasty  about  618  a.d.  The  classification  varies 
a good  deal,  and  some  individual  writers  are  placed  in 
different  classes  in  other  editions.  Thus  Yii-tzi,  or  Yii 
Hiung,  the  venerable  teacher  of  Won-wang  (twelfth  century 
B.C.),  whose  little  work  on  government  would  be  the  oldest 
text  extant  in  Chinese  literature  if  it  could  be  proved  to  be 
genuine,  is  classed  among  Tauists  in  the  Ming  collection 
referred  to,  and  among  Confucianists  in  another  Ming  col- 
lection published  in  1577,  while  one  of  the  latest  large 
collections,  published  in  the  reign  of  T’ung-chi  (1862- 
1875),  the  Tzi-shu-pai-chung,  “A  Hundred  Philosoph- 
ical Texts,”  more  correctly  places  him  among  the  miscel- 
laneous authors.  This  comprehensive  series  contains  also 
special  headings  for  military  writers,  some  of  whom,  as 
living  under  the  Chou  dynasty,  have  already  been  men- 
tioned, and  other  classes  containing  writers  of  later  periods. 
It  cannot  be  said  that  the  Confucianists  are  represented  by 
any  prominent  writers,  besides  Mencius,  toward  the  end  of 
the  Chou  dynasty ; and  the  principal  minor  philosophers  to 
be  noted  were  Tauists.  One  among  these  is  Won,  perpetu- 
ated in  the  work  entitled  Wdn-tz'i,  “The  Philosopher  Won.” 
This  may  be  a fictitious  name,  since  we  do  not  know  whether 


THE  CONTENDING  STATES 


307 


such  a personage  ever  existed ; but  seeing  that  the  principal 
theses  of  Lau-tzi’s  philosophy,  of  which  the  work  purports 
to  be  an  extension,  are  discussed  in  it  in  a manner  purely 
philosophical  and  free  from  the  charlatanic  pretenses  of 
later  Tauists,  we  may  be  right  in  considering  the  work  in  its 
main  substance  as  of  Chou  origin.  Other  philosophical 
works  ascribed  to  this  period  must  be  held  to  be  the  fabri- 
cations of  later  compilers.  To  know  this  is  of  special  im- 
portance to  the  historical  student,  on  account  of  the  many 
cultural  anachronisms  which  may  appear  in  texts  credited 
with  ancient  origin,  but  amalgamated  with  matter  con- 
temporaneous with  later  editors.  Such  a work  is  the  Kuan- 
yin-tzl,  ascribed  to  a philosopher  Kuan-yin,  whom  tradition 
represents  as  an  official  in  charge  of  one  of  the  mountain 
passes  leading  from  China  to  the  distant  West,  probably 
an  entirely  legendary  personage,  who  is  also  supposed  to 
have  met  Lau-tzi  riding  on  a buffalo,  on  leaving  China  for- 
ever, and  to  have  received  from  him  then  the  manuscript  of 
his  Tau-td-king. 

Among  the  minor  philosophers  of  the  Contending  States 
is  that  typical  class,  the  Chinese  designation  of  which,  tsung- 
hong-kia,  I have  ventured  to  translate  by  “criss-cross 
philosophers”;  the  term  tsung-hong  being  written  with 
different  characters,  a mode  of  writing  implying  that  their 
teaching  was  both  horizontal  and  vertical,  meaning  that 
they  taught  the  art  of  persuading  every  one  to  anything. 
Another  interpretation  is  that  they  were  prepared  to  place 
their  dialectics  at  the  service  of  the  two  opposing  political 
factions  of  the  time,  federation  (tsung),  or  imperialism 
(hong).  They  were  the  sophists  among  Chinese  philoso- 
phers, and  the  chief  professor  of  their  art  was  Kui-ku-tzi, 
“Philosopher  of  the  Devil  Valley,”  so  called  after  his 


308 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


sanctuary  in  the  hills,  whose  proper  name  was  Wang  Hii. 
The  work  left  under  the  name  of  Kui-ku-tzi  has  been  com- 
mentated and  provided  with  a preface  by  T’au  Hung-king, 
the  greatest  scholar  of  his  time,  who  lived  451-536; 
but  with  all  this  it  seems  doubtful  whether  the  work  as- 
cribed to  him,  though  it  has  an  ancient  ring  about  it,  actu- 
ally originated  with  the  man  whose  name  it  bears.  Possibly 
he  was  an  entirely  legendary  personage.  But  if  legendary, 
Kui-ku-tzi  is  likely  to  have  existed  as  the  type  of  a professor 
of  dialectics,  to  whose  school  ambitious  young  men  would 
flock  to  study  the  art  of  persuasion  for  future  use  in  the 
service  of  the  state.  Certainly  we  have  it  on  the  authority 
of  Ssi-ma  Ts’ien  ^ that  two  of  the  greatest  diplomats  China 
has  ever  produced,  who,  by  the  mere  use  of  their  tongues, 
directed  the  march  of  events  in  state  life  and  whose  policy, 
moreover,  stamped  them  to  be  antipodes  to  one  another, 
were  fellow-students  under  Kui-ku  Sien-shong,  “ Teacher  of 
the  Devil  Valley,”  who  in  a work  of  the  second  century  of 
the  present  era  is  described  as  a tsung-hong-kia^  i.e.  a 
“criss-cross  philosopher.”  But  for  that  the  philosopher’s 
teaching  would  involve  no  more  than  the  good  general 
education  imparted  by  a little  college  to  a couple  of  friends, 
who  are  afterward  found  in  opposite  political  camps. 

§ 63.  Su  Ts’in  and  Chang  I 

Such  were  the  two  great  diplomats  Su  Ts’in  and  Chang  I, 
of  whom  I have  already  spoken.  Soon  after  their  college 
days  in  the  “Devil  Valley”  these  two  young  men  set  out 
on  the  time-honored  career  of  itinerant  political  adventurers. 
The  two  main  political  factions,  the  constitution  of  which 

* Shi-ki,  ch.  Ixix,  p.  1;  ch.  Ixx,  p.  1. 

^ Giles,  A Chinese  Biographical  Dictionary,  p.  388,  no.  1014. 


THE  CONTENDING  STATES 


309 


varied  a good  deal  with  the  success  or  non-success  of  their 
diplomatic  leaders,  may  be  described  as  Ts’in  and  Anti- 
Ts’in.  Ts’in,  that  semi-barbarous  state  on  the  western 
boundary  destined  to  become  the  ruin  of  the  Chou  dynasty, 
strove  hard  for  hegemony  among  the  Contending  States  and 
was  well  on  the  way  to  ascendency.  Among  the  other 
states  some,  on  the  advice  of  Su  Ts’in,  entered  into  con- 
federation. Being  an  opportunist  of  the  purest  water, 
Su  Ts’in  had  at  first  made  up  his  mind  to  hang  on  to  the 
power  most  likely  to  succeed;  but  the  schemes  by  which 
he  tried  to  persuade  the  King  of  Ts’in  to  crush  his  rivals 
made  no  impression,  and  he  left  the  court  of  Ts’in  smarting 
under  the  mortification  of  a man  who  had  been  snubbed, 
though  he  might  have  done  great  service.  Ill-rewarded,  he 
returned  to  his  home  in  the  imperial  dominion  of  Chou, 
where  his  own  folk,  including  his  brothers  and  wives,  heap- 
ing insult  upon  injury,  ridiculed  him  as  the  would-be  great 
man  who  had  come  back  penniless  and  a beggar.  Handi- 
craft and  trade,  they  said,  would  have  been  much  better 
for  him  than  cultivating  his  tongue.'  Su  Ts’in,  however, 
now  devoted  himself  again  to  his  books  in  order  to  perfect 
himself  in  the  field  he  had  orginally  entered,  which  may 
be  properly  described  as  that  of  diplomacy ; and  thus  pre- 
pared, he  conceived  the  great  plan  of  persuading  the  most 
powerful  princes  to  enter  into  a confederation  against  Ts’in, 
thus  counteracting  the  schemes  he  had  originally  defended 
with  such  ill-success.  His  wounded  pride  must  have  helped 
him  to  develop  that  persistency  of  purpose  which  made  him 
overcome  all  the  difficulties  besetting  the  path  of  a man, 
unknown  and  despised,  but  determined  to  gain  the  ear  of 

’ Ssi-ma  Ts’i6n  places  this  episode  before  his  visit  to  the  court 
of  Ts’in. 


310 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


so  many  powerful  princes.  Having  worked  his  way  through 
numerous  back  doors,  he  managed  to  obtain  an  interview 
with  the  Duke  of  Yen  at  his  capital,  the  present  Peking, 
whom  he  succeeded  in  persuading  that  confederation  and 
immediate  action  against  Ts’in  were  the  only  means  to 
prevent  the  minor  states  from  being  swallowed  up.  From 
this  time  he  became  one  of  the  great  men  of  China.  The 
Duke  of  Yen  made  him  his  confidential  ambassador  and 
sent  him  in  turn  to  the  courts  of  Chau,  Han,  Wei,  Ts’i,  and 
Ch’u.  Dr.  W.  A.  P.  Martin,  in  his  most  interesting  paper 
"Diplomacy  in  Ancient  China,”  ^ says  with  regard  to  the 
unprecedented  diplomatic  success  of  all  these  several  mis- 
sions, which  had  brought  great  honors  on  Su  Ts’in’s  head 
from  the  several  sovereigns  concerned  in  the  scheme : — 

“The  achievement  was  one  the  difficulty  and  grandeur  of  which 
it  is  not  easy  to  overestimate.  The  man  who  conceived  the  plan 
and,  with  steady  purpose,  carried  it  through,  deserved  all  the  honors 
that  were  heaped  upon  him.  Like  Prince  Bismarck,  who  to  the 
chancellorship  of  the  empire  adds  that  of  the  kingdom  of  Prussia, 
Su  held  a duplicate  or  rather  multiple  office.  His  chief  dignity  was 
that  of  president  of  the  sextuple  alliance,  and  in  order  that  he  might 
render  it  effective,  each  of  the  six  powers  conferred  on  him  the  seal 
of  a separate  chancellorship.” 

From  Su  Ts’in’s  great  scheme  of  confederation  dates  the 
term,  well  known  in  Chinese  history,  liu-kuo,  i.e.  “ the  Six 
States.” 

Ssi-ma  Ts’ien’s  chapter  on  Su  Ts’in  contains  in  terse 
language  the  several  arguments  he  used  in  persuading  the 
princes  of  these  six  kingdoms  to  his  policy,  each  of  whom 
he  won  over  to  his  side  by  carefully  allowing  for  local  and 
personal  idiosyncrasies.  Su  Ts’in’s  great  success  was,  of 
* Journal  of  the  Peking  Oriental  Society,  vol.  ii,  1889,  pp.  241-262. 


THE  CONTENDING  STATES 


311 


course,  based  on  the  force  of  circumstances,  though  it 
seems  that  in  the  general  turmoil  none  of  the  Contending 
States  had  as  yet  thought  of  stirring.  Ts’in  had  gained 
victory  after  victory  over  one  or  another  of  its  neighbors; 
and  nothing  seemed  more  natural  than  the  conclusion  of  a 
defensive  alliance  like  the  one  negotiated  by  Su  Ts’in,  in 
which  it  was  stipulated  that  whenever  any  of  the  Six  States 
were  attacked  by  Ts’in  the  other  five  should  come  to  the 
rescue,  and  that  if  any  of  the  contracting  states  should  re- 
fuse the  call,  the  other  states  should  punish  it  with  their 
united  forces.  This  was  in  333  b.c. 

Su  Ts’in  was  loaded  with  honors  and  made  his  head- 
quarters the  court  of  Chau.  There  he  was  approached  by 
his  old  fellow-student  Chang  I,  almost  his  equal  as  a 
scheming  statesman,  though  his  first  venture  at  the  court 
of  the  southern  state  of  Ch’u  had  proved  a failure  owing  to 
the  intrigues  of  a courtier,  who  had  falsely  accused  him  of 
theft  and  exposed  him  to  the  degrading  punishment  of  the 
bastinado,  after  which  he  had  fled  to  the  north  to  seek 
refuge  with  his  powerful  friend.  Su  Ts’in  saw  in  Chang  a 
rival  rather  than  a comrade,  and  tried  to  shake  him  off  by 
giving  him  money  and  servants  to  pave  his  way  to  the 
court  of  Ts’in,  although  certain  crafty  designs  of  a different 
kind  have  been  assigned  to  this  move.'  If  Su  Ts’in  thought 
he  had  laid  a trap  for  his  rival  by  causing  him  to  accept 
the  most  tempting  gifts  from  an  unknown  benefactor  who 
would  afterward  reveal  himself  as  the  arch-enemy  of  the 
Ts’in  court,  he  was  mistaken.  Chang  I proved  his  equal 
as  a diplomat  by  disowning  his  connection  with  his  former 
friend.  Not  in  vain  had  he  trusted  to  the  power  of  his 

' Ch.  Piton,  The  Six  Great  Chancellors  of  Ts’in,  or  the  Conquest  of 
China  by  the  House  of  Ts’in,  in  China  Review,  vol.  xiii,  p.  132. 


312 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


tongue.  When,  after  his  flight  from  the  court  of  Ch’u,  he 
reached  his  home  in  the  kingdom  of  Wei,  his  wife  reproached 
him  upon  the  entire  failure  of  his  life,  but  Chang  I simply- 
replied,  "Just  see  whether  my  tongue  is  still  in  its  place”; 
and  on  her  remarking  that  it  was,  he  said  quietly,  “ That 
will  do.”  With  this  same  tongue  he  made  a deep  impression 
on  Hui-w6n,  Duke  of  Ts’in,  to  whom  he  had  submitted  his 
anti-confederate  schemes  and  who  straightway  appointed 
him  an  adviser  ad  hoc  with  the  rank  of  a minister.  In  the 
sequel  he  did  excellent  service  both  as  an  administrator  by 
developing  the  resources  of  the  country  and  as  a military 
leader. 

His  great  task,  as  a diplomat,  was  to  counteract  the  work 
of  his  former  friend  Su  Ts’in,  whose  superior  he  apparently 
was  in  the  craftiness  of  his  schemes.  After  a successful 
war  against  the  kingdom  of  Ch’u  in  312  b.c.,  Ts’in  was  very 
anxious  to  negotiate  about  the  acquisition  of  a certain 
boundary  province  belonging  to  the  king  of  Ch’u,  who 
offered  its  cession  for  no  other  consideration  than  the 
delivery  of  the  person  of  Chang  I.  That  wily  statesman, 
far  from  objecting,  even  volunteered  to  place  himself  into 
the  hands  of  the  southern  king.  He  trusted  to  the  power 
of  his  tongue  and  to  certain  personal  connections  at  the 
court  of  Ch’u,  whose  king  put  him  in  prison  to  await  exe- 
cution. Chang  I,  however,  had  not  in  vain  counted  on  the 
help  of  a friend  who  happened  to  be  the  right  hand  of  the 
king’s  favorite  wife.  Tliis  friend  excited  her  jealousy  by 
telling  her  that  the  prince  of  Ts’in  intended  to  ransom  the 
prisoner  by  the  gift  of  a beautiful  woman.  This  had  the 
desired  effect.  The  king  of  Ch’u’s  wife  used  all  her  in- 
fluence in  bringing  about  Chang  I’s  release  and  return  to 
the  court  of  Ts’in  before  the  much-dreaded  ransom  could 


THE  CONTENDING  STATES 


313 


be  despatched.  Su  Ts’in’s  "Six  State  Confederation”  had 
succeeded  in  delaying  the  designs  of  Ts’in  for  a number  of 
years,  it  is  true,  but  in  the  long  run  Chang  I’s  policy  got 
the  better  of  his.  In  the  meantime  the  shadow  emperor 
Hien-wang  was  followed  by  his  son  Shon-tsing-wang. 

§ 64.  Shon-tsing-wang  (320-315  b.c.) 

The  history  of  this  ruler,  like  that  of  his  successors, 
scarcely  deserves  to  be  considered  as  representing  China. 
The  chief  events  of  his  reign  were  an  unsuccessful  attempt 
by  five  of  the  confederate  states  to  attack  Ts’in,  ending  in 
their  defeat  at  the  Han-ku  Pass  in  Ho-nan,  the  place  where 
Lau-tzi  is  supposed  to  have  taken  leave  of  the  world,  and 
the  assassination  of  Su  Ts’in  in  317  b.c.  Su  Ts’in’s  lucky 
star  had  been  on  the  wane  for  some  time.  We  have  seen 
that  he  had  settled  in  the  state  of  Chau  as  the  strongest 
among  the  confederates,  and  his  efforts  in  holding  together 
the  federation  had  indeed  succeeded,  as  Ssi-ma  Ts’ien  puts 
it,  in  keeping  the  armies  of  Ts’in  out  of  the  Han-ku  Pass 
for  fifteen  years.  But  in  the  meantime  Ts’in  had  secured 
the  services  of  another  great  diplomat,  like  Chang  I,  a 
native  of  Wei,  in  the  person  of  Kung-sun  Yen,  who  was 
sent  on  a mission  to  the  east  to  persuade  the  rulers  of  Ts’i 
and  Wei  into  a joint  attack  on  Chau  with  intent  to  break  up 
the  confederation.  In  this  he  perfectly  succeeded,  Chau 
was  actually  attacked  by  the  two  confederates  (332  b.c.)  ; 
and  from  this  time  onward  Ts’in  had  become  more  and 
more  successful  in  its  policy  of  sowing  discord  among  its 
opponents. 

Su  Ts’in  had,  after  the  collapse  of  his  scheme,  fallen  out 
with  the  prince  of  Chau  and,  under  the  pretext  of  a diplo- 
matic mission,  had  withdrawn  to  the  state  of  Yen,  where  he 


314 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


accepted  the  post  of  minister.  But  there  he  was  involved 
in  a scandal  with  the  mother  of  his  prince,  which  forced 
him  to  take  refuge  again  at  the  court  of  Ts’i.  His  intrigues 
in  Ts’i,  however,  created  dissatisfaction  among  the  people 
and  led  to  his  assassination.  Chang  I,  who  had  for  a num- 
ber of  years  been  chancellor  of  Wei,  was  called  after  the 
death  of  his  opponent  to  Ts’in  again,  which  by  the  policy 
of  its  great  chancellor  had  greatly  increased  in  territory,  its 
latest  conquest  (316  b.c.)  being  that  of  the  country  of  Shu, 
the  present  province  of  Ssi-ch’uan.  One  of  the  most  power- 
ful rivals  of  the  state  of  Ts’in  was  the  southern  kingdom  of 
Ch’u,  which  had  attained  supremacy  over  the  whole  of  the 
south  of  China  by  the  conquest  of  the  kingdom  of  Yiie  in 
334  B.c.  Shon-tsing-wang  was  succeeded  by  his  son  Nan- 
wang. 

§ 65.  Nan-wang  (314-256  b.c.) 

'This  monarch  was  the  last  Son  of  Heaven  under  the  Chou 
dynasty.  Like  all  his  predecessors,  he  wore  the  modest 
title  king  (wang) ; but  several  of  the  more  powerful  states 
being  nominally  his  vassals,  had  in  the  course  of  generations 
assumed  the  rank  of  kingdoms.  Tlie  Chou  empire  now 
consisted  of  eleven  states,  all  the  heads  of  which,  with  the 
exception  of  two,  had  in  the  course  of  time  enforced  from 
the  shadow  emperor  their  recognition  as  kings ; and  as  such, 
every  one  of  them  was  much  more  powerful  than  the  king 
of  Chou  himself.  A title  is  not,  of  course,  an  absolutely 
exact  index  of  the  power  wielded;  for  the  rulers  of  Ts’in 
had  been  among  the  strongest  long  before  they  assumed 
the  title  wang  in  325  b.c.  It  seems  characteristic  that  for 
centuries  Ch’u,  which  owing  to  its  gi’eat  extension  toward 
the  south,  and  the  non-Chinese  character  of  its  population. 


THE  CONTENDING  STATES 


315 


would  naturally  feel  less  inclined  to  be  loyal  in  its  relations 
to  the  imperial  court,  claimed  the  royal  crown  as  early  as 
704  B.c.  Ts’i  followed  next  in378  b.c.  ; Wei,  in370  b.c.  ; Yen 
and  Han,  in  332  b.c.  ; Chau,  in  329  b.c.  ; and  Sung,  following 
Ts’in,  in  318  b.c.  The  prince  of  Lu  had  remained  a duke  as 
he  was  at  the  time  of  Confucius ; and  the  rulers  of  the  little 
state  of  Wei  (not  to  be  confounded  with  the  larger  one  of 
that  name),  who  had  been  dukes  for  many  centuries,  had  to 
submit  to  “Irish  promotion”  by  being  reduced  to  the  rank 
of  marquises,  and  finally  that  of  mere  lords  {kiin). 

Two  years  after  the  ascension  of  Nan-wang,  Ts’in  gained 
that  great  victory  against  Ch’u  following  which  Chang  I 
volunteered  to  proceed  to  the  southern  court  as  a captive 
of  the  king.  This  proved  to  be  a ruse  of  war,  by  which 
Ts’in  gained  as  much  as  Ch’u  lost.  King  Huai  of  Ch’u 
then  had  in  his  service  a distant  relative  named  K’ii  Yiian, 
a man  of  character,  who  in  spite  of  his  youth  had  gained, 
by  the  wisdom  of  his  advice,  the  king’s  entire  confidence, 
K’ii  Yiian  had  in  vain  protested  against  the  artful  schemes 
of  Chang  I,  as  he  had  warned  the  king  against  that  war 
which  brought  so  much  trouble  on  his  country.  His  ad- 
vice had  been  disregarded;  and  the  persistency  of  his 
warnings  paved  the  way  for  the  intrigues  of  a set  of  jealous 
courtiers,  who  managed  to  bring  about  his  absolute  dis- 
grace with  the  king.  His  melancholy  outbursts  of  feeling 
over  the  unjustness  of  his  fate  formed  the  subject  of  a 
celebrated  poem  by  him  entitled  Li-sau,  “Incurring  Mis- 
fortune,” or  “Under  a Cloud.”  Finally,  the  poet  put  an 
end  to  the  persecutions  of  his  enemies  by  drowning  himself 
in  a river.  This  sad  event  is  commemorated  throughout 
China  on  the  anniversary  of  its  occurrence,  viz.  the  fifth  of 
the  fifth  moon,  by  a kind  of  regatta,  when  well-to-do  young 


316 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


men  man  boats  and  beat  gongs  and  drums  as  though  they 
were  searching  for  the  body  of  the  lamented  poet  who 
sacrificed  life  and  happiness  in  doing  his  best  to  serve  his 
king  and  his  country. 

Next  to  the  odes  of  the  Shi-king  K’ii  Yiian’s  poetry  is  in 
point  of  age  as  well  as  of  merit  the  most  important  produc- 
tion of  Chinese  literature  of  this  class,  which  saw  its  best 
days  centuries  later  under  the  glorious  T’ang  dynasty. 
The  Li-sau  poem  is  the  principal  contribution  to  the  collec- 
tion known  as  Ch’u-tz’l,  “Tlie  Ch’u  Elegies,”  which  has  an 
extensive  literature  of  its  own  by  way  of  commentary  and 
supplement.  K’ii  Yiian’s  effusions  are  almost  imequaled 
in  popularity,  because  they  appeal  to  the  hearts  of  all  who 
feel  that  world-weary  melancholy  which  is  the  subject  also 
of  some  of  the  odes  of  the  Shl-king. 

The  king  of  Ts’in’s  great  diplomat,  Chang  I,  tried  very 
hard  to  win  over  the  eastern  states  to  Ts’in;  but  in  the 
meantime  King  Hui-w5n,  who  had  occupied  the  throne  of 
Ts’in  since  337  b.c.,  had  died  (311  b.c.)  ; and  King  Wu,  his 
successor  (310-307  b.c.),  does  not  seem  to  have  fallen  in 
so  readily  with  Chang  I’s  policy.  After  Chang  I’s  attempts 
at  a federation  in  favor  of  Ts’in  had  failed,  he  left  again 
for  Wei,  where  he  resumed  the  post  of  minister  and  died 
soon  after  (310  b.c.).  Wu-wang  himself  died  after  a short 
reign  in  Ts’in,  during  which  a successful  war  with  the  state 
of  Han  ended  with  a further  aggrandizement  of  his  territory. 
It  was  at  this  time  (308  b.c.)  that  Wu-ling,  King  of  Chau, 
adopted  Tartar  dress  and  remodeled  his  army  by  intro- 
ducing the  Tartar  style  of  fighting  on  horseback  — a 
cultural  change  supporting,  as  we  have  seen,  that  upheaval 
of  time-honored  institutions  and  views  always  favored  by 
Ts’in,  the  semi-Tartar  state. 


THE  CONTENDING  STATES 


317 


An  important  time  was  now  in  store  for  the  state  of 
Ts’in  under  its  king,  Chau-siang  (306-251  b.c.),  during 
whose  long  reign  great  strides  were  made  in  bringing  Ts’in 
to  the  front.  Chau-siang  was  a minor  when  he  ascended 
the  throne,  and  his  mother,  who  had  assumed  the  regency 
as  Siian  t’ai-hou,  i.e.  "Queen  Dowager  Siian,”  appointed 
Wei  Jan,  a relative  by  marriage  of  the  former  king  Hui- 
won,  though  a native  of  Ch’u,  commander-in-chief  of  the 
army  and  defender  of  the  Ts’in  capital  Hien-yang,  the 
present  Si-an-fu,  which  appointment  had  become  necessary 
to  secure  the  throne  against  internal  family  intrigues. 
Wei  Jan’s  management  proved  a great  success.  The 
efficiency  of  his  army,  supported  by  all  possible  ruses  both 
of  war  and  diplomacy,  succeeded  in  securing  the  upper 
hand  over  the  other  states.  King  Huai  of  Ch’u,  who  had 
already  become  the  victim  of  Chang  I’s  cunning,  fell  into 
a trap  laid  by  the  wily  Ts’in  diplomat.  Being  invited,  after 
a number  of  unsuccessful  hostilities  to  an  interview,  under 
the  pretext  of  concluding  an  alliance  with  Ts’in,  he  went, 
contrary  to  the  advice  of  his  faithful  friend,  the  poet 
K’ii  Yiian,  to  the  appointed  meeting-place,  only  to  be 
made  a prisoner  (299  b.c.)  and  to  die  in  captivity  three 
years  later. 

In  the  continuation  of  its  wars  with  the  southern  state 
of  Ch’u,  Ts’in  wrenched  from  it  seventy-six  cities,  with  large 
tracts  of  territory.  In  the  meantime  some  of  the  eastern 
states  had  again  rallied  and  had  formed  an  alliance.  King 
Chau-siang  had  also  taken  into  his  service  Mong-ch’ang- 
kiin,  a member  of  the  T’ien  family  of  Ts’i,  who  acted  as 
diplomatic  agent.  Being  suspected  of  secretly  working  in 
the  interests  of  his  native  state,  Ts’i,  he  had  a narrow  escape 
in  saving  his  life  by  flight,  took  service  in  Ts’i,  formed  an 


318 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


alliance  with  Han  and  Wei,  and  actually  did  some  damage 
to  Ts’in,  which  had  to  surrender  three  of  the  cities  previ- 
ously conquered  by  it  on  the  east  of  the  Yellow  River 
(298  B.C.).  Wei  Jan  now  became  chancellor  in  Ts’in  and 
appointed  the  great  strategist  Po  K’i  commander-in-chief 
in  his  place.  Po  K’i  entirely  crushed  the  armies  of  Han 
and  Wei  in  the  famous  battle  of  I-k’iie  (south  of  the  present 
city  of  Ho-nan-fu),  where  240,000  combatants  were  killed 
and  further  territory  was  gained  by  Ts’in  (293  b.c.).  In  his 
subsequent  encounters  with  the  allied  armies,  Po  K’i  was 
equally  successful;  and  the  several  annexations  of  neigh- 
boring territories  increased  King  Chau-siang’s  power  to 
such  an  extent  that  as  early  as  288  b.c.  an  attempt  was 
made,  on  the  advice  of  Wei  Jan,  to  crown  him  as  “ Emperor 
of  the  West.”  The  most  powerful  sovereign  among  the 
eastern  states  was  now  the  king  of  Ts’i,  which  state  had 
made  rapid  progress  since  the  recognition  of  the  T’ien 
family  as  hereditary  rulers;  and  the  services  of  a man  like 
Mong-ch’ang-kiin,  who  must  have  been  thoroughly  familiar 
with  all  the  schemes  of  the  Ts’in  court,  may  have  tended  to 
qualify  it  all  the  better  for  leadership  in  the  east.  For 
this  reason  King  Chau-siang  could  not  claim  sufficient  in- 
fluence to  justify  his  assumption  of  the  title  of  emperor 
of  the  whole  of  China,  but  he  took  that  of  “ Western  Em- 
peror” (Si-ti),  at  the  same  time  sending  an  embassy  to 
King  Min  of  Ts’i  offering  him  a diploma  as  “Eastern 
Emperor”  {Tung-ti).  King  Min’s  adviser  Su  Tai,  a brother 
of  Su  Ts’in,  the  creator  of  the  anti-Ts’in  confederation,  was 
in  favor  of  accepting  the  diploma  without  assuming  the 
title;  such  modesty,  he  thought,  would  win  the  favors  of 
the  other  sovereigns.  Ts’i  adopted  this  plan,  when  Ts’in 
had  no  alternative  but  to  follow  the  example,  and  the 


THE  CONTENDING  STATES 


319 


emperor  question  was  shelved  for  the  time  being.  In 
286  B.c.  Ts’i  was  involved  in  war  with  the  state  of  Sung, 
which  was  incorporated  into  its  territories;  and  in  the  fol- 
lowing year  (285  b.c.)  King  Min  made  an  attempt  to  establish 
himself  as  emperor;  but  the  king  of  Yen  in  284  b.c., 
backed  by  the  states  of  Ts’in,  Ch’u,  Chau,  and  Wei,  sent 
against  Ts’i  his  general  Yo  I,  who  took  the  capital,  forced 
the  king  to  flee,  and  conquered  over  seventy  cities,  annexing 
them  to  the  possessions  of  Yen.  King  Min  was  killed  by 
his  own  minister.  The  throne  of  Ts’i  was  then  occupied 
by  his  son  Siang-wang.  The  attacks  of  Yen  on  the  leading 
state  of  Ts’i  gave  the  king  of  Ts’in  a free  hand  to  pick  a 
quarrel  with  the  neighboring  state  of  Chau,  and  in  280  b.c. 
Po  K’i  was  able  to  report  a victory  which  had  cost  20,000 
of^the  Chau  soldiers  their  lives.  Two  years  later  (278  b.c.), 
Ts’in  turned  again  against  its  most  powerful  opponent, 
the  state  of  Ch’u;  General  Po  K’i  conquered  Ying,  its 
capital,  the  present  King-chou-fu  in  Hu-pei,  and  destroyed 
I-ling,  the  burial-place  of  the  kings  of  Ch’u,  in  its  neigh- 
borhood. During  the  succeeding  years  Ts’in  was  success- 
ful in  several  wars  against  one  or  another  of  the  eastern 
states.  An  attack  on  Chau  was,  however,  repulsed  in 
270  B.C.,  when  the  army  of  Ts’in  was  completely  routed 
under  the  leadership  of  the  Chau  commander  Chau  Sho. 

In  266  B.c.  an  important  crisis  took  place  in  the  govern- 
ment of  Ts’in.  For  about  forty  years  Wei  Jan  had  been 
the  soul  of  Ts’in’s  political  aggrandizement.  As  a relative 
and  favorite  of  the  queen  dowager,  it  had  been  easy  for 
him  to  grasp  the  reins  of  government  with  a firm  hand,  and 
while  effectually  serving  the  cause  he  had  made  his  own, 
the  absolute  supremacy  of  Ts’in  among  the  states  of  China, 
he  had  also  managed  to  concentrate  in  his  person  an 


320 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


accumulation  of  property  and  power  which  in  the  long  run 
became  uncomfortable  to  his  sovereign,  who  had  in  the 
meantime  grown  to  manhood.  King  Chau-siang  in  266  b.c. 
made  an  end  to  the  regency  of  his  mother  and  to  the  chancel- 
lorship of  Wei'  Jan,  who  was  banished  to  his  marquisate 
Jang  in  the  present  province  of  Ho-nan.  Wei  Jan’s  dis- 
missal from  the  king’s  service  was  accompanied  with  all 
the  honors  due  to  his  rank  and  to  a recognition  of  his  valu- 
able services;  but  it  is  characteristic  of  Wei  Jan’s  career 
that,  when  his  baggage  was  searched  on  passing  the  eastern 
boundary,  it  was  discovered  that  he  owned  more  jewels  than 
the  king  of  Ts’in  himself.  Wei  Jan  died  soon  after  his 
banishment.  His  place  in  Ts’in  was  occupied  by  Fan 
Tsii,  one  of  those  itinerant  politicians  whose  rivalry  Wei 
Jan  had  always  feared  and  had  kept  out  of  the  court  of 
Ts’in.  Being  a native  of  Wei,  Fan  Tsii  had,  after  an 
adventurous  career  coupled  with  all  possible  privations  and 
humiliations,  managed  to  foil  Wei  Jan’s  vigilance  and,  after 
a personal  interview  with  King  Chau-siang,  had  received 
an  appointment  in  the  ministry  (270  b.c.).  It  was  he  who 
brought  about  that  change  in  the  Ts’in  government  which 
led  to  the  ruin  of  Wei  Jan  and  three  other  ministers  sup- 
porting his  policy;  and  having  by  his  advice  and  moral 
support  helped  the  king  to  occupy  at  last  his  rightful  posi- 
tion, he  saw  himself  suddenly  raised  to  be  the  most  power- 
ful man  in  China,  with  the  rank  of  a marquis.  The  manner 
in  which  he  took  revenge  on  some  of  his  enemies  in  the  east 
for  all  the  humiliations  they  had  forced  him  to  undergo  is 
full  of  dramatic  incidents. 

Fan  Tsii,  of  course,  continued  the  outward  policy  of  his 
predecessor  in  striving  for  the  hegemony  of  Ts’in.  In  this 
he  was  supported  at  first  by  the  great  general  Po  K’i,  who 


THE  CONTENDING  STATES 


321 


in  260  B.c.  won  another  leaf  in  his  wreath  of  laurels  by  the 
celebrated  siege  of  the  city  of  Shang-tang,  the  present  Lu- 
an-fu,  in  Shan-si.  Sometime  before  this  Ts’in  had  got  pos- 
session, by  force  of  arms,  of  a portion  of  the  state  of  Han; 
but  the  people  of  Shang-tang  would  not  consent  to  its 
annexation  and  preferred  to  join  the  state  of  Chau,  with  that 
portion  of  its  territory  which  contained  the  city.  This  led 
to  another  war  against  Chau,  whose  army  was  defeated  and 
inclosed  in  the  city  of  Shang-tang.  There  it  was  besieged 
by  the  Ts’in  army  for  forty-six  days,  the  population  suffer- 
ing the  most  terrible  hardships  culminating  in  cannibalism. 
With  the  city  40,000  men  surrendered  and  were  killed. 

§ 66.  The  "Four  Nobles” 

The  final  struggle  of  the  house  of  Ts’in  against  the  other 
Contending  States  was  delayed  by  the  efforts  of  the  so-called 
“ F our  N obles  ’ ’ (ssl-hau) , prominent  members  of  the  princely 
houses  of  their  respective  states  or  of  princely  rank  who 
had  gained  great  influence  coupled  with  political  success 
in  the  management  of  the  government  of  their  sovereigns. 
One  of  these  we  have  already  met  in  the  person  of  Mong- 
ch’ang-kiin,  the  minister  of  Ts’i,  the  once  rejected  employee 
of  the  Ts’in  government.  'The  three  others  were  P’ing- 
yuan-kiin,  a junior  prince  of  Chau,  who  died  in  250  b.c.; 
Sin-ling-kiin,  known  also  as  Prince  Wu-ki  of  Wei,  who  died 
in  244  B.c. ; and  Ch’un-shon-kiin,  the  chief  minister  of 
Ch’u,  whose  proper  name  was  Huang  Hi6  and  who  was 
assassinated  in  237  b.c.  The  “ Four  Nobles”  were  the  chief 
antagonists  of  Fan  Tsii’s  policy. 

Huang  Hi6,  the  only  one  of  the  "Four  Nobles”  who  was 
not  of  princely  blood,  had  been  made  prime  minister  and 
ennobled  as  prince  by  King  K’au-lie  of  Ch’u;  and  on  his 


322 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


advice  the  Ch’u  capital  was  removed  from  its  former  site 
at  the  present  King-chou-fu  to  that  of  the  present  Soochow 
(248  B.C.).  Huang  Hie  had  been  tutor  to  the  king  when 
crown  prince,  and  since,  previous  to  his  succession  to  the 
throne,  his  master  resided  as  a pledge  in  Ts’in,  he  must  have 
been  well  familiar  with  Ts’in  politics.  In  258  b.c.  Ts’in 
renewed  its  attacks  on  Chau  and  surrounded  Han-tan,  its 
capital.  This  time  the  famous  general  Po  K’i,  having 
fallen  out  with  the  chancellor  Fan  Tsii,  had  refused  to  place 
himself  at  the  head  of  the  Ts’in  army,  which  led  to  his  dis- 
grace and  subsequent  suicide.* 

Two  of  the  “Four  Nobles,”  Ch’un-shon-kiin  of  Ch’u  and 
Sin-ling-kiin  of  Wei,  now  came  to  the  rescue  under  the 
leadership  of  the  latter,  raised  the  siege,  killed  Wang  Ho, 
the  Ts’in  general,  and  defeated  his  army.  All  the  troubles 
Ts’in  had  to  undergo  in  connection  with  this  defeat  were 
due  to  mistakes  made  by  the  chancellor  Fan  Tsii,  whose 
hostility  to  the  best  military  leader  the  state  had  seen  in 
many  years  had  deprived  King  Chau-siang  of  one  of  his 
most  useful  subjects,  to  say  nothing  of  the  mortification 
it  must  have  caused  him  to  have  committed  such  grave 
injustice.  It  was  due  to  Fan  Tsii’s  favoritism  that  incapa- 
ble generals  had  been  sent  against  Chau. 

Fan  Tsii,  knowing  his  guilt,  acted  in  truly  Chinese  spirit, 


* To  save  him  the  humiliation  of  an  execution,  the  king  had  sent 
him  a sword,  with  which  he  killed  himself.  It  looks  as  if  this  is 
an  early  example  of  a custom  prevailing  in  China  centuries  before  it 
took  the  shape  of  harakiri  in  Japan.  The  difference  is  that  by  the 
Japanese  custom  the  victim  had  to  cut  his  abdomen,  while  the  dis- 
graced Ts’in  general  cut  his  throat.  The  essential  feature  of  Po 
K’i’s  undeserved  punishment  is  that  a sword  was  sent  to  him,  just 
as  it  used  to  be  sent  to  the  daimyos  and  samurai  of  Japan,  who  were 
exempted  from  the  indignity  of  public  execution. 


THE  CONTENDING  STATES 


323 


when  he  asked  Chau-siang  to  punish  him  for  his  mistakes; 
but,  far  from  doing  this,  Chau-siang  only  rewarded  him  with 
new  honors.  This  was  in  257  b.c.  A most  important 
event  now  took  place. 

As  a result  of  previous  treaties  it  had  become  customary 
to  send  princes  of  the  blood  as  pledges  to  the  courts  of  con- 
tracting states,  from  whence  they  escaped  when  political 
reasons  rendered  such  a breach  of  good  faith  advisable. 
We  have  seen  that  in  263  b.c.  the  crown  prince  of  Chau 
fled  from  the  court  of  Ts’in,  and  we  find  now  Prince  I-jon, 
son  of  the  crown  prince  of  Ts’in,  residing  as  a pledge  at  the 
court  of  Chau.  I-jon  was  not  a legitimate  successor  of  his 
father,  being  one  of  the  many  sons  born  to  him  by  his 
concubines.  Poor  and  not  very  sharp-witted,  illiterate  and 
inexperienced,  he  was  the  very  man  to  become  the  victim 
of  a clever  intrigant.  At  the  city  of  Han-tan,  the  capital 
of  Chau,  he  had  made  the  acquaintance  of  a merchant 
named  Lu  Pu-wei,  who  had  come  from  one  of  the  eastern 
states  to  settle  there,  and  who  was  one  of  the  most  remark- 
able men  of  his  time.  Described  as  a wholesale  merchant 
at  the  time  when  he  fell  in  with  the  prince,  he  soon  proved 
a scheming  politician,  who  understood  how  to  lay  his  plans 
and  raise  his  own  person  to  a position  which  made  him 
almost  the  principal  agent  in  securing  for  the  house  of  Ts’in 
the  final  result,  for  which  it  had  struggled  so  many  genera- 
tions, in  seating  its  head  on  the  throne  of  China.  AVhen  he 
first  met  I-jon,  he  is  reported  to  have  said,  '"This  is  rare 
merchandise  indeed,  and  a good  chance  !”  And  he  decided 
to  make  the  most  of  it.  His  first  scheme  was  based  on  the 
fact  that  the  prince’s  father,  the  crown  prince  of  Ts’in,  had 
no  children  by  his  legitimate  first  wife,  Hua-yang,  in  spite 
of  his  infatuation  for  her.  Since  I-jon’s  father  did  not  make 


324 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


much  of  his  children  by  his  other  wives,  he  persuaded  the 
prince  to  make  an  effort  to  be  recognized  as  heir  to  the 
throne.  The  young  man  did  not  exert  himself  much  in 
the  matter;  his  clever  friend  did  it  all  for  him.  Lii  Pu-wei 
invested  his  entire  little  fortune  in  procuring  an  outfit  for 
the  needy  prince  and  in  buying  royal  gifts  in  order  to  bribe 
himself  into  favor  with  the  childless  queen.  He  thus  man- 
aged to  get  his  proteg^  to  be  adopted  in  preference  to  his 
half-brothers  and  declared  heir  apparent  to  the  crown  prince. 

Having  succeeded  so  far,  Lii  Pu-wei  committed  one  of  the 
boldest  frauds  recorded  in  history.  He  married  a society 
girl  of  the  city  of  Han-tan,  described  as  a woman  of  irre- 
sistible charms  and  a clever  dancer,  subsequently  known  as 
the  '‘Lady  of  Han-tan,”  whom  history  declares  to  have 
been  pregnant  by  him,  though  the  world  never  hears  the 
truth  about  such  family  secrets,  and  the  possibility  of  the 
prince  having  had  connection  with  her  at  Han-tan  as  Lii 
Pu-wei’s  friend  must  be  admitted.  I-jon  fell  in  love  with 
her;  and  Lii  Pu-wei,  with  feigned  reluctance,  consented 
to  let  him  have  her,  while  persuading  him  that  the  boy  to 
which  she  afterward  gave  birth  had  been  begotten  by  the 
prince.  It  was  not  till  after  the  birth  of  this  boy,  whose 
name  was  Chong,  that  I-jon  made  the  beautiful  dancer  his 
wife.  According  to  Ssi-ma  Ts’i^n,  all  this  took  place  before 
the  prince’s  flight  from  Han-tan,  which,  according  to  the  same 
author,  was  effected  by  Lii  Pu-wei  bribing  the  city  guards. 
When,  a few  years  later  (251  b.c.).  King  Chau-siang  died 
after  a reign  of  fifty-six  years,  I-jon’s  father  followed  him 
as  king  of  Ts’in  under  the  throne  name  Hiau-won-wang, 
and  I-jon  became  crown  prince.  It  appears  that  it  was 
not  till  then  that  the  Lady  of  Han-tan  with  her  son  Chong 
made  her  entry  at  the  court  of  Ts’in,  the  people  of  Chau 


THE  CONTENDING  STATES 


325 


having  up  to  this  time  put  difficulties  in  the  way  of  their 
departure  from  the  country.  I-jon’s  son,  Chong,  the  re- 
puted natural  offspring  of  a simple  merchant,  was  no  less 
a personage  than  the  future  Emperor  Shi-huang-ti,  “the 
Burner  of  the  Books,”  as  we  shall  see  in  the  sequel. 

During  the  last  few  years  of  old  King  Chau-siang’s  gov- 
ernment, Ts’in  had  gained  further  victories  over  Han  and 
Chau  (256  b.c.),  resulting  in  great  augmentations  of  its 
territory  and  enormous  loss  of  life  of  the  contending  armies. 
The  shadow  emperor  Nan-wang  had  made  an  unsuccessful 
attempt  to  assert  himself  by  trying  to  form  another  alli- 
ance among  the  eastern  states;  but  the  result  was  that 
Ts’in  invaded  his  territory  and  wrenched  the  western  part 
of  it  from  him.  Soon  after  Nan-wang  died  (256  b.c.), 
leaving  the  eastern  part  of  his  dominion  to  a relative,  who 
reigned  there  under  the  style  of  Tung-Chou-kiin,  “ Prince  of 
Eastern  Chou,”  until  the  year  249  b.c.,  when  Ts’in  put  an 
end  to  this  last  remnant  of  the  once  glorious  dynasty  by 
making  the  regent  a prisoner  and  annexing  his  territory. 
The  Emperor  Yii’s  nine  sacred  tripods  had  been  in  the  hands 
of  the  Chou  kings  ever  since  Wu-wang  conquered  them 
from  the  vicious  Emperor  Chou-sin.  A year  after  Nan- 
wang’s  defeat  they  were  taken  possession  of  by  the  king 
of  Ts’in. 

In  255  B.c.  the  philosopher  Siin  K’uang,  the  opponent  of 
Mencius,  inasmuch  as  he  held  that  man’s  nature  was  bad 
from  the  outset  and  not  good,  as  the  Confucianists  main- 
tain, was  appointed  to  the  high  office  of  governor  in  the 
state  of  Ch’u,  where  he  exercised  great  influence  under  the 
patronage  of  Ch’un-shon-kiin.  The  death  of  that  states- 
man brought  about  his  dismissal,  upon  which  he  devoted 
himself  to  the  education  of  pupils,  chief  among  them  being 


326 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


the  philosopher  Han-Fei-tzi  and  the  great  anti-Confucian- 
ist  Li  Ssi  destined  ere  long  to  play  a conspicuous  part. 
Ch’u  had  in  255  b.c.  made  conquests  in  Lu  (south  Shan- 
tung) ; and  in  254  b.c.,  after  Ts’in  had  wrenched  a city 
from  Wei,  the  king  of  Han  did  homage  at  its  court  at  the 
funeral  ceremony  of  the  late  king,  while  the  other  states 
confined  their  courtesies  to  sending  messages  through  some 
official. 

The  court  of  Han  had  ever  since  the  last  one  hundred  and 
seventy  years  refrained  from  paying  this  tribute  of  acknowl- 
edgment to  the  Son  of  Heaven,  and  the  orthodox  Confucian 
writers  of  the  Tung-kien-kang-mu  look  upon  this  act  of 
prudence  as  a grave  sin,  the  punishment  for  which  followed 
in  due  course ; for  while  Han  was  the  first  state  to  recog- 
nize the  leadership  of  Ts’in,  it  was  also  the  first  to  be  swal- 
lowed up  by  Ts’in  within  less  than  a generation. 

§ 67.  The  Leadership  of  Ts’in  (256-221  b.c.) 

After  the  death  of  Nan-wang  there  was  actually  no  Son 
of  Heaven  in  China.  Tung-Chou-kiin,  "the  Lord  of 
Eastern  Chou,”  was  a scion  of  the  Chou  family,  it  is  true, 
but  he  could  not  even  claim  the  title  of  wang.  With  the 
loss  of  the  sacred  tripods  he  had  forfeited  the  right  to  call 
himself  "Son  of  Heaven” ; and,  to  complete  the  ceremonial 
part  of  taking  up  the  position  as  the  representative  of  the 
Chinese  nation,  without  actually  assuming  the  title  of 
emperor.  King  Chau-siang  had  in  253  b.c.  offered  sacri- 
fice to  Shang-ti,  the  Supreme  Ruler,  the  one  god  with 
whom,  by  the  tradition  dating  from  the  very  beginning  of 
Chinese  history,  only  the  emperor  is  supposed  to  communi- 
cate. 


THE  CONTENDING  STATES 


327 


The  thirty-six  years  following  Nan-wang’s  death  are, 
therefore,  a kind  of  interregnum,  such  as  is  found  in  the 
history  of  the  German  empire  during  the  years  1254  to 
1273.  It  was  the  time  of  Ts’in’s  final  and  successful 
struggle  with  its  rivals  for  supreme  power.  Of  this  period 
I have  already  recorded  some  introductory  events.  King 
Chau-siang’s  son,  I-jon’s  father,  Hiau-won,  reigned  one 
year,  or,  not  counting  his  term  of  mourning,  only  three 
days,  when  I-jon  succeeded  him  under  the  style  of  Chuang- 
siang-wang  (249-247  b.c.).  He  and  Lii  Pu-wei'  were  sworn 
friends;  and  no  sooner  was  the  former  exile  seated  on  the 
throne  than  he  appointed  Lii  Pu-wei  prime  minister  with 
almost  unlimited  powers,  at  the  same  time  raising  him  to 
the  rank  of  marquis.  It  might  look  like  an  acknowledg- 
ment of  the  alleged  historic  scandal  concerning  the  paternity 
of  Chong,  the  crown  prince,  that  this  very  son  afterward 
added  to  these  honors,  as  a special  title,  the  designation 
Chung-fu,  “Second  Father”;  but  I am  inclined  to  look 
upon  this  very  act  as  a refutation  of  what  may  after  all 
have  been  idle  gossip,  if  not  a deliberate  falsehood  invented 
by  the  Confucianists  in  order  to  place  their  greatest  enemy, 
the  destroyer  of  Confucian  literature,  under  a cloud.  If 
among  the  intimates  of  the  comT  of  Ts’in  there  had  been 
the  merest  shadow  of  a doubt  as  to  his  paternity,  the  young 
king  would  certainly  not  have  been  imprudent  enough  to 
invent  for  his  prime  minister  just  this  title;  nor  would  Lii 
Pu-wei  have  had  any  interest  in  inducing  him  to  bestow  it. 

Lii  Pu-wei’s  chief  merit  in  the  advancement  of  the  cause 
of  Ts’in  is  the  clever  trick  with  which  he  succeeded  in  regu- 
lating the  succession  to  the  throne  among  about  twenty 
claimants.  But  for  him  internal  troubles  might  have 
delayed,  if  not  prevented,  final  success.  One  of  his  first 


328 


THE  ANCIENT  HISTORY  OF  CHINA 


political  acts  was  the  definite  extinction  of  the  last  remnant 
of  Chou  independence  by  the  capture  of  the  eastern  Chou 
capital,  situated  near  the  present  Ho-nan-fu,  and  formally 
deposing  its  prince.  In  the  same  year  he  sent  the  general 
Mong  Au  against  Han,  thus  ill  requiting  the  loyalty  pre- 
viously shown  by  its  prince ; the  same  leader,  who  was  the 
grandfather  of  the  great  Ts’in  general  Mong  Then,  then  was 
sent  with  varying  success  against  Chau  and  Wei.  Though 
Ts’in  was  defeated  in  247  b.c.  by  Sin-ling-kiin,  one  of  the 
“Four  Nobles”  who  did  so  much  to  check  Ts’in’s  final 
progress,  the  outcome  of  the  several  campaigns  undertaken 
by  Lii  Pu-wei  was  further  aggrandizement  of  Ts’in  territory. 
Sin-ling-kiin,  the  valiant  leader  of  the  state  of  Wei,  had 
placed  himself  at  the  head  of  the  combined  forces  of  the 
five  states  Wei,  Han,  Chau,  Ts’i,  and  Ch’u,  which  would 
probably  have  been  a perfect  match  against  Ts’in  had  he 
succeeded  in  keeping  them  together. 

King  Chuang-siang,  alias  I-jon,  died  after  a short  reign 
of  about  three  years,  leaving  his  son  Chong,  then  a boy 
of  thirteen,  to  succeed  him.  Hu  An-kuo  (died  1138  a.d.), 
one  of  the  commentators  of  the  T’ung-kien-kang-mu,  sug- 
gests that  the  premature  death  of  the  two  kings  Hiau-won 
and  Chuang-siang  may  have  been  caused  by  Lii  Pu-wei ; 
and  though  no  positive  statement  to  that  effect  is  on  record 
in  the  older  historians,  it  must  be  admitted  that  these  two 
lives  were  the  only  obstacles  to  his  becoming  practically 
supreme  ruler  in  Ts’in.  Hiau-wbn’s  death  gave  him  a free 
hand  with  his  old  friend,  whom  he  had  raised  to  the  throne, 
it  is  true,  but  whose  memory  he  subsequently  betrayed  by 
scandalous  intimacy  with  the  queen-mother,  his  first  wife, 
Chuang-siang’s  dowager. 


APPENDIX 


CHRONOLOGICAL  TABLES 


I.  MYTHOLOGICAL  AND  LEGENDARY 


P’an-ku,  the  first  ruler  and  originator  of  mankind. 

T’ien-huang,  “Heavenly  Emperors.”  Thirteen  brothers,  each 
reigning  18,000  years. 

Ti-huang,  “Terrestrial  Emperors.”  Eleven  brothers. 

J dn-huang,  “Human  Emperors.”  Nine  brothers. 

Wu-lung,  “Five  Dragons,”  and  other  generations  of  rulers  bearing 
fanciful  names. 

Yin-ti  epoch.  Thirteen  families  known  as  Yu-ch’au,  or  “Nest 
Builders.” 

Sui-jon,  “ Fire  Producer.” 

B.C. 


Fu-hi,  the  alleged  first  emperor  . 

Shon-nung,  or  Yen-ti 

Huang-ti,  the  Yellow  Emperor,  or  Hien-yuan 
Shau-hau,  son  of  Huang-ti  .... 
Chuan-hii,  Huang-ti ’s  grandson  Kau-yang  . 
Ti-k’u,^  a nephew  of  Chuan-hii  . 

Ti-chi,  son  of  Ti-k’u 


2852-2738  > 

2737-2705 

2704-2595 

2594-2511 

2510-2433 

2432-2363 

2362-2358 


II.  THE  CONFUCIAN  LEGENDS 


Yau,  Ti-chi’s  step-brother 2357-2258 

Shun,  a self-made  man  of  the  people  ....  2258-2206 


* Note  that  the  dates  here  inserted  are  those  of  the  Chinese  standard  chro- 
nology as  adopted  by  the  greater  part  of  the  native  historians.  There  is,  besides, 
the  chronology  of  the  Bamboo  Books,  differing  by  fully  200  years  at  the 
beginning.  Readers  will  find  them  in  Professor  Arendt’s  Synchronistische 
Regententabellen,  from  which  the  data  here  communicated  have  been  derived. 

^ Ti  means  emperor  and  is  prefixed  to  the  names  of  several  of  the  early 
rulers  (Ti-chi,  Ti-k’i,  Ti-siang,  Ti-ch’u,  etc.),  the  name  being  occasionally 
quoted  without  the  prefix. 


329 


330 


APPENDIX 


The  Hia  Dynasty,  2205-1766  b.c.  b.c. 

Yii,  Ta-yu,i\iQ‘‘ QveaX  Yu,”  OT  Hia-h6u  . . . 2205-2198 

Ti-k’i,  or  K’i,  Yii’s  son 2197-2189 

T’ai-k’ang,  Ti-k’i’s  son 2188-2160 

Chung-k’ang,  T’ai-k’ang’s  younger  brother  . . 2159-2147 


First  eclipse  of  the  sun  mentioned  in  Chinese  his- 
tory, possibly  one  of  the  several  dates  calcu- 
lated by  European  savants,  viz. 


'2165,  May  7 
2155,  Oct.  22 
2154,  Oct.  11 
2135,  Oct.  21 
2127,  Oct.  12 
,2006,  Oct.  24 


Ti-siang,  Chung-k’ang’s  son 

. 2146-2119 

Han-cho,  the  usurper 

. 2119-2079 

Shau-k’ang,  Ti-siang’s  son  . 

. 2079-2058 

Ti-ch’u,  Shau-k’ang’s  son  . 

. 2057-2041 

Ti-huai,  Ti-ch’u ’s  son 

. 2040-2015 

Ti-mang,  Ti-huai ’s  son 

. 2014-1997 

Ti-sie,  Ti-mang’s  son 

. 1996-1981 

Ti-pu-kiang,  Ti-sie’s  son 

. 1980-1922 

Ti-kiung,  Ti-pu-kiang’s  younger  brother  . 

. 1921-1901 

Ti-kin,  Ti-kiung’s  son 

. 1900-1880 

Ti-k’ung-kia,  Ti-pu-kiang’s  son  . 

. 1879-1849 

Ti-kau,  Ti-k’ung-kia’s  son  . 

. 1848-1838 

Ti-ja,  Ti-kau ’s  son 

. 1837-1819 

Kie,  also  Kui,  Ti-kui,  and  Kie-kui, 

Ti-fa’s  son  . 

. 1818-1766 

III.  THE  SHANG,  OR  YIN,  DYNASTY,  1766-1122  b.c. 


Ch’dng-t’ang,  T’ang,  or  Shang-t’ang  .... 

Had  reigned  as  prince  of  Shang  since  1783 
T’ai-kia,  Ch’ong-t’ang’s  grandson  .... 

Wu-ting,  T’ai-kia’s  son  ...... 

T’ai-kong,  Wu-ting’s  younger  brother 

Siau-kia,  T’ai-kong’s  son 

Yung-ki,  Siau-kia’s  younger  brother  . . . . 

T’ai-7n6u,  or  Chung-tsung,  another  brother  of  Siau-kia's 

Chung-ting,  T’ai-mou’s  son 

Wai-jon,  Chung-ting’s  younger  brother 


1766-1754 

1753-1721 

1720-1692 

1691-1667 

1666-1650 

1649-1638 

1637-1563 

1582-1550 

1549-1535 


APPENDIX 


331 


Ho-t’an-kia,  another  brother  of  Chung-ting’s 

Tsv/-i,  son  of  Ho-t’an-kia 

Tsu-sin,  Tsu-i’s  son 

Wu-kia,  younger  brother  of  Tsu-i  . . . . 

Tsu-ting,  Tsu-sin ’s  son 

Nan-kong,  Wu-kia ’s  son 

Yang-kia,  Tsu-ting’s  son 

P’an-kong,  Yang-kia ’s  younger  brother 
Siau-sin,  P’an-kong ’s  younger  brother 
Siau-i,  Siau-sin ’s  younger  brother  . . . . 

Wu-ting,  or  Kau-tsung,  Siau-i’s  son  . . . . 

Tsu-kong,  Wu-ting’s  son 

Tsu-kia,  Tsu-kong’s  younger  brother  . . . • 

Ldn-sin,  Tsu-kia ’s  son  

Kong-ting,  Lin-sin’s  younger  brother  . . . . 

Wu-i,  Kong-ting’s  son 

T’ai-ting,  Wu-i’s  son 

Ti-i,  T’ai-ting’s  son 

Chdu-sin,  Sh6u,  or  Shdu-sin,  Ti-i’s  son 

IV.  THE  DUKES  OF  CHOU  BEFORE  WU- 

T’an-fu,  or  Ku-kung  (“The  Old  Duke”)  at  his  new 

residence  as  Duke  of  Chou 

Ki-li,  T’an-fu’s  son  

Won-wang,  Ki-li ’s  son,  also  called  Ch’ang  and  Si-po,  or 

“Chief  of  the  West”  

Wu-wang,  so  called  as  first  emperor  of  the  Chou  dynasty 
(personal  name  Fa) 

V.  THE  IMPERIAL  CH6u  DYNASTY,  1122- 

Wu-wang,  first  king  of  Chou 

Ch’dng-wang,  Wu-wang’s  son 

K’ang-wang,  Ch’ong-wang’s  son 

Chau-wang,  K’ang-wang’s  son 

Mu-wang,  Chau-wang’s  son 

Kung-wang,  Mu-wang’s  son 


B.C. 

1534-1526 

1525-1507 

1506-1491 

1490-1466 

1465-1434 

1433-1409 

1408-1402 

1401-1374 

1373-1353 

1352-1325 

1324-1266 

1265-1259 

1258-1226 

1225-1220 

1219-1199 

1198-1195 

1194-1192 

1191-1155 

1154-1122 

-WANG 


1327-1231 

1230-1185 

1184-1135 

1134-1123 

•249  B.C. 

1122-1116 

1115-1079 

1078-1053 

1052-1002 

1001-947 

946-935 


332 


APPENDIX 


I *-wang,  Kung-wang’s  son 

B.C. 

. 934-910 

Hiau-wang,  Kung-wang’s  younger  brother 

. 909-895 

I ^-wang,  I ^-wang’s  son 

. 894-879 

Li-wang,  son  of  I ’-wang 

. 878-842 

The  Kung-ho  period  of  interregnum 

. 841-828 

Suan-wang,  Li-wang’s  son 

. 827-782 

Yu-wang,  Siian-wang’s  son 

. 781-771 

P’ing-wang,  Yu-w’ang’s  son 

. 770-720 

Huan-wang,  P’ing-wang’s  grandson 

. 719-697 

Chuang-wang,  Huan-wang’s  son  .... 

. 696-682 

Hi-wang,  Chuang-wang’s  son 

. 681-677 

Hui-wang,  Hi-wang’s  son  ..... 

. 676-652 

Siang-wang,  Hui-wang’s  son 

. 651-619 

K’ing-wang,  Siang-wang’s  son 

. 618-613 

K’uang-wang,  K’ing-wang’s  son  .... 

. 612-607 

Ting-wang,  K’uang-wang’s  younger  brother  . 

. 606-586 

Kien-wang,  Ting-wang’s  son 

. 585-572 

Ling-wang,  Kien-wang’s  son 

. 571-545 

King  ^-wang,  Ling-wang’s  son 

. 544-520 

King  *-wang,  son  of  the  former  .... 

. 519-476 

YiXan-wang,  son  of  King-wang  .... 

. 475-469 

Chon-ting-wang,  Ytian-wang’s  son  .... 

. 468-441 

K’au-wang,  a younger  son  of  Chon-ting-wang’s 

. 440-426 

Wei-lie-wang,  K’au-wang’s  son  .... 

. 425-402 

An-wang,  Wei-lie-wang’s  son  ..... 

. 401-376 

Lie-wang,  An-wang ’s  son 

. 375-369 

Hien-wang,  Lie-wang’s  younger  brother  . 

. 368-321 

Shon-tsing-wang,  Hi4n-wang’s  son  .... 

. 320-315 

Nan-wang,  Shon-tsing-wang’s  son  .... 

. 314-256 

Tung-chdu-kiin,  the  “Prince  of  Eastern  Chou” 

. 255-249 

VI.  PRINCES  OF  TS’IN 


The  state  of  Ts’in  (to  be  distinguished  from  Tsin)  had  grown  out 
of  a small  territory  near  the  present  city  of  Si-an-fu,  given  by  the 
emperor  Hiau-wang  to  a member  of  the  Ts’in  family  by  name  of 
Fei-tzi  as  keeper  of  his  herds  of  horses.  From  small  beginnings 
Ts’in  gradually  grew  to  become  the  most  powerful  among  the 


APPENDIX 


333 


feudal  states  during  the  Chou  dynasty,  occupying  the  greater  part 
of  the  present  Shen-si  province  and  indefinite  tracts  of  territory 
to  the  west  of  it. 


Fd-tn  (lord  of  Ts’in) 

about 

B.C. 

897-858 

Ts’in-h6u  {i.e.  marquis  of  Ts’in) 

. 

857-848 

Kung-po 

. 

847-845 

Ts’in-chung  (since  827  minister  at  the 

imperial  court) 

844-822 

Duke  Chuang 

821-778 

“ Slang  . 

. 

777-766 

“ Won 

• 

765-716 

“ Wu,  or  Ning 

• « 

715-704 

“ Ch’u,  or  Ch’u-tzi 

703-698 

“ Wu 

697-678 

“ To 

, , 

677-676 

“ Siian 

, , 

675-664 

“ Ch’dng  . 

663-660 

“ Mu,  or  Jon-hau 

659-621 

“ K’ang,  or  Ying 

. • 

620-609 

“ Rung  . 

• 

608-604 

“ Huan 

. , 

603-577 

“ King 

• « 

576-537 

“ Ai  . . 

. 

536-501 

“ Hui 

500-492 

“ Tau 

, , 

491-477 

“ Rung,  or  Ld-kung 

. , 

476-443 

“ Tsau 

442-429 

“ Huai 

428-425 

“ Ling 

. . 

424-415 

“ Kien  . 

414-400 

“ Hui 

. , 

399-387 

“ Ch’u,  or  Ch’u-td 

, , 

386-385 

“ Hien  . 

384-362 

“ Hiau 

* , 

361-338 

King  Hui-won 

337-311 

“ Wu  . 

, 

310-307 

“ Chau-siang  . 

, • 

306-251 

334 


APPENDIX 


B.C. 

King  Hiau-wdn 250 

“ Chuang-siang,  Ch’u,  or  I-jdn  ....  249-247 
“ Chong  {=Ts’in  Shi-huang-ti) , as  king  of  Ts’in  246-221 
as  emperor  of  China 220-210 


VII.  PRINCES  OF  TSIN 


The  state  of  Tsin  (to  be  distinguished  from  Ts’in)  had  grown  out 
of  a fief  given  to  a younger  son  of  Wu-wang,  the  founder  of  the 
Chou  dynasty,  by  name  of  Yii,  and  situated  in  the  southern  part  of 
the  present  Shan-si  pro^vince,  which  filled  the  greater  part  of  its 
later  extent.  It  was  conterminous  with  Ts’in  in  the  west  and  the 
Huns  in  the  north.  In  745  b.c.  Marquis  Chau  had  appointed  his 
uncle  lord  of  K’ii-wu  in  South  Shan-si,  whose  descendants  usurped 
the  throne  and  were  confirmed  as  dukes  of  Tsin  in  678  b.c. 


Yu,  or  Shu-yu  (invested  with  the  territory  of  T’ang) 
Marquis  Sie,  Yii’s  son 
“ Wu 
“ Ch’ong 
“ U 

“ Tsing 

“ Li,  or  Hi 

“ Hien 

“Mu 

Shang-shu,  u.surper 

Marquis  Won  

“ Chau 

“ Hiau 

“ Au 

“ Ai 

“ Siau-tzi 

“ Min  ...  . . . . 

Usurpers  of  the  house  of  K’u-vou  (678-376  b.c.) 

Duke  TF  u 

“ Him 

“ Hui 


1107 


858-841 

840-823 

822-812 

811-785 

784-781 

780-746 

745-739 

738-724 

723-718 

717-710 

709-705 

704-679 

678-677 

676-651 

650-638 


APPENDIX 

Duke  Huai 

335 

B.c. 

. 637 

“ Won,  or  Ch’ung-ir  .... 

• 

. 636-628 

“ Siang 

. 627-621 

“ Ldng  

. 620-607 

“ Ch’dng 

. 606-600 

“ King 

. 599-581 

“Li 

. 580-573 

“ Tau 

. 572-558 

“ P’ing 

. 557-532 

“ Chau 

. 531-526 

“ K’ing 

. 525-512 

“ Ting 

. 511-474 

“ Ch'u 

. 473-457 

“ Ai 

. 456-439 

Yu 

. 438-420 

“Lie 

. 419-393 

“ Hiau  

. 392-378 

“ Tsing  

. 377-376 

376  B.c.  Duke  Tsing  was  cEj)oscd,  and  his  territory  dmded  by 

the  princes  of  Wd.,  Han,  and  Chau. 

Vni.  PRINCES  OF 
Marquis  TFon  (confirmed  403  b.c.)  . 

WEI 

. 425-387 

“ Wu 

. 386-371 

King  Hui 

. 370-335 

“ Siang 

. 334-319 

“ Ai 

. 318-296 

“ Chau  

. 295-277 

“ An-hi 

. 276-243 

“ King-min 

. 242-228 

“ Kia 

. 227-225 

Wei  was  annexed  by  Ts’in  in  225  b.c. 

IX.  PRINCES  OF 
Marquis  King  (confirmed  403) 

HAN 

. 408-400 

“Lie 

• 

. 399-387 

336 


APPENDIX 


Marquis  Won 

B.c. 

. 386-377 

“ Ai 

. 376-371 

“I 

. 370-359 

“ Chau  .... 

. 358-333 

King  Silan-hui  .... 

. 332-312 

“ Siang 

. 311-296 

“ Hi  (Kiu)  .... 

. 295-273 

“ Huan-hui  .... 

. 272-239 

“An 

. 238-230 

Han  was  annexed  by  Ts’in  in  230  b.c. 

X.  PRINCES  OF 
Marquis  lAe  (confirmed  403)  . 

CHAU 

. 408-400 

Duke  Wu 

. 399-387 

Marquis  King 

. 386-375 

“ Ch’ong  .... 

. 374-350 

“ Su 

. 349-326 

King  W u-ling 

. 325-299 

“ Hui-won  .... 

. 298-266 

“ Hiau^ch’ong  .... 

. 265-245 

“ Tau-siang  .... 

. 244-236 

“ Ts’ien  (Yu-mu)  . 

. 235-228 

Chau  was  partly  annexed  by  Ts’in  in  228  b.c. 

the  annexation 

being  completed  in  222  b.c. 


XL  PRINCES  OF  CH’U 

Ch’u,  originally  the  country  of  the  southern  barbarians  (nan- 
man),  occupied  the  entire  south  of  the  federal  states,  especially  the 
country  on  both  banks  of  the  Yang-tzi  in  its  middle  course.  Its 
first,  probably  legendary,  prince  was  supposed  to  have  been  a 
great-grandson  of  Yu-hiung,  the  philosopher  and  teacher  of  Won- 
wang.  This  was  Hiung  I,  supposed  to  have  been  invested  as  prince 
of  Ch’u  by  Ch’ong-wang.  The  princes  of  Ch’u  henceforth  have 
the  surname  Hiung. 

Viscount  Hiung  I about  1100 

“ “ Ai 1078-1053 


APPENDIX 


337 


E.C. 


Viscount  Hiung  T’an 

, , 

• * 

1052-1002 

U U 

Shong 

. 

. 

1001-947 

u u 

Yang 

. 

946- 

u u 

K’u,  temporarily  “King” 

about . 

887 

U it 

Mu-k’ang  (died  prematurely) 

t(  i( 

Chi-hung 

867-8G6 

U (( 

Yen  . 

865-848 

(C  (t 

Yung  . 

847-838 

C(  it 

Yen  . 

837-828 

<(  u 

Shuang 

827-822 

i(  i( 

Sun  . 

821-800 

U t( 

Au 

799-791 

((  t( 

I,  or  Jo-au . 

790-764 

U t( 

Siau-au 

763-758 

U ti 

Fon-mau  . 

757-741 

King  Wu 

740-690 

“ Won  . 

689-677 

Tu-au 

676-672 

King  Ch’ong 

671-626 

“ Mu  . 

625-614 

“ Chuang 

613-591 

“ Rung  . 

590-560 

“ K’ang 

559-545 

Kia-au 

544-541 

King  Ling  . 

540-529 

“ P’ing  . 

528-516 

“ Chau  . 

515-489 

“ Hui  . 

488-432 

“ Kien  . 

431-408 

“ Shong  . 

407-402 

“ Tau  . 

401-381 

“ Su  . 

380-370 

“ Suan  . 

369-340 

“ Wa  . 

339-329 

“ Huai  . 

328-299 

“ K’ing-siang  . 

298-263 

338 


APPENDIX 


B.C. 

King  Yu 237-228 

“ Ai 228 

“ Fu-ch’u 227-223 

Ch’u  was  annexed  by  Ts’in  in  223  b.c. 

XII.  PRINCES  OF  YEN 

Yen  was  the  northernmost  among  the  eastern  states  and  fell 
together  with  the  greater  part  of  modern  Chi-li.  One  duke  of 
Shau  by  name  of  Shi  is  mentioned  as  the  first  prince  of  Yen;  his 
ninth  descendant,  Marquis  Hui,  heads  the  line  of  those  whose  names 
and  periods  of  government  have  become  known. 


Marquis  Hui 

864-827 

(( 

Hi  . 

826-791 

U 

K’ing 

790-767 

Duke  Ai 

766-765 

Marquis  Chong 

764-729 

ii 

Mu 

728-711 

il 

Silan 

710-698 

(( 

Huan 

697-691 

Duke 

Chuang 

690-658 

U 

Siang  . 

657-618 

ii 

Huan  . 

617-602 

ii 

Siian  . 

601-587 

ii 

Chau  . 

586-574 

ii 

Wu  . 

573-555 

ii 

Won  . 

554-549 

a 

I 

548-545 

a 

Hui  . 

544-536 

a 

Tau  . 

535-529 

ii 

Rung  . 

528-524 

ii 

P’ing  . 

523-505 

ii 

Kien  . 

504-493 

a 

Hien  . 

492-465 

ii 

Hiau  . 

464-450 

a 

Ch'ong 

449-434 

a 

Min  . 

433-403 

APPENDIX 


339 


B.C. 

Duke  Hi 402-373 

“ Huan 372-362 

“ Won 361-333 

King  1 332-321 

“ K’uai 320-314 

“ Chau 311-279 

“ Hui 278-272 

“ Wu-ch’6ng 271-258 

“ Hiau 257-256 

“Hi 255-222 


Yen  was  conquered  by  Ts’in  in  222  b.c. 


XIII.  PRINCES  OF  TS’I 

The  state  of  Ts’i  occupied  the  southeastern  shore  of  the  Yellow 
River  and  fell  together  with  the  northeast  of  the  present  Shan- 
tung province.  The  legitimate  line  of  its  princes  is  headed  by 
T’ai-kung  Shang,  said  to  have  been  invested  with  it  by  Wu-wang. 
In  the  fourth  century  a line  of  usurpers  set  in,  who  adopted  the  family 
name  T’icn,  the  name  of  the  legitimate  line  superseded  by  them, 
being  Lit. 

a.  Princes  of  the  Lii  Family 


Duke  Ting  . 

. 1077-1052 

“ I 

. 1051-1001 

“ Kui  . 

. 1000-935 

“ Ai  . 

934^894 

“ Hu  . 

893-860 

“ Hien  . 

. 859-851 

“ Wu  . 

• 850— 82o 

“ U 

82F-816 

“ Tl^on  . 

815-804 

“ Ch’dng 

803-795 

“ Chuang 

794-731 

“ Hi  . 

730-698 

“ Siang  . 

697-68G 

“ Huan  . 

685-643 

340 


APPENDIX 


Duke  Hiau  . 

B.c. 

642-633 

U 

Chau  . 

632-613 

u 

I 

612-609 

u 

Hui  . 

608-599 

u 

K’ing . 

598-582 

IC 

Ling  . 

581-554 

u 

Chuang 

553-548 

(( 

King  . 

547-489 

u 

Tau  . 

488-485 

(( 

Kien  . 

484-481 

(( 

P’ing  . 

480-456 

({ 

Siian  . 

455-405 

(( 

K’ang 

404-379 

b.  Princes  of  the  T’ien  Family 


en-/io  (confirmed  as  duke  of  Ts’i,  386  B.c.)  . . 410-385 

Duke  Huan 384-379 

King  Wa 378-343 

“ Siian 342-324 

“ Min 323-284 

“ Siang  283-265 

“ Kien 264-221 

Ts’i  was  annexed  by  Ts’in  in  221  b.c. 


XIV.  PRINCES  OF  LU 

The  state  of  Lu  occupied  the  southern  part  of  the  present  Shan- 
tung province  on  the  south  of  Ts’i.  The  chronology  of  the  princes 
of  Lu  has  been  made  the  basis  by  Confucius  of  his  historical  work, 
the  Ch’un-ts’iu,  for  which  reason  it  claims  special  attention  during 
the  period  concerned.  The  first  prince  of  the  state  was  Chdu-kung, 
the  brother  of  Wu-wang.  The  chronology  down  to  Duke  Chon  is 
doubtful. 

Duke  Chdu  (Chdu-kung) 1122-1109 

“ Po-k’in 1108-1063 

“ K’au 1062-1059 

“ Yang 1058-1053 


APPENDIX 


341 


B.C. 


Duke  Yu 

1052-1039 

u 

Wa 

1038-  989 

u 

Li 

988-952 

u 

Him  . 

951-. . . 

u 

Chon  . 

855-826 

i( 

Wu 

825-816 

a 

I. 

815-807 

u 

Po-yu  (usurper) 

806-796 

u 

f 

{( 

Hiau  . 

795-769 

d 

Hui 

768-723 

u 

Yin 

722-712 

00 

1 

(( 

Huan  . 

711-694 

(N 

(N 

u 

Chuang 

693-662 

Q 

u 

Min 

661-660 

n 

t( 

Hi 

659-627 

T?  ' 

Q 

Won  . 

626-609 

o> 

u 

Siian  . 

608-591 

a 

s 

ti 

Ch’ong . 

590-573 

u 

Siang  . 

572-542 

1 

u 

Chau  . 

541-510 

u 

Ting  . 

509-495 

n 

Ai 

494-468 

u 

Tau 

467-431 

u 

Yuan  . 

430-410 

u 

Mu  . 

409-377 

u 

Kung  . 

376-355 

ci 

K’ang  . 

354-346 

u 

King  . 

345-315 

u 

P’ing  . 

314-296 

a 

Won  . 

295-273 

it 

K’ing  . 

272-249 

Lu  was  annexed  by  Ch’u  in  249  b.c. 


XV.  PRINCES  OF  SUNG 

Sung  was  one  of  the  central  states,  with  its  capital  near  the  present 
Kui-to-fu  in  Ho-nan.  Its  line  of  princes  is  headed  by  Wei-tzi,  a 
prince  of  the  Shang  dynasty  and  an  opponent  of  the  tyrant  Shou-sin. 


342 


APPENDIX 


B.C. 


Wn-t^  K’i  . 

1112-1079 

Wm.  Chung  . 

1078-1054 

Duke  K’i  of  Sung 

1053-1001 

U 

Ting  . 

1000-936 

if 

Min  . 

935-909 

ii 

Yang  . 

908-894 

U 

Li  . 

893-859 

u 

Hi  . 

858-831 

a 

Hui  . 

830-801 

a 

Ai 

800 

if 

Tai 

799-766 

a 

Wu  . 

765-748 

if 

Siian  . 

747-729 

ii 

Mu  . 

728-720 

a 

Shang 

719-710 

a 

Chuang 

709-692 

if 

Min  . 

691-682 

<{ 

Huan  . 

681-651 

if 

Siang  . 

650-637 

ii 

Ch’dng 

636-620 

ii 

Chau  . 

619-611 

if 

Won  . 

610-589 

if 

Rung  . 

588-576 

a 

P’ing  . 

575-532 

if 

Yuan  . 

531-517 

it 

King  . 

516-451 

ii 

Chau  . 

450-404 

a 

Tau  . 

403-396 

a 

Hiu  . 

395-375 

ii 

Pi  . 

374-370 

ii 

T’i-ch’ong  . 

369-329 

King 

Yen  (king  since  318)  . 

. 

. 

328-286 

Sung  was  annexed  by  Ts’i  in 

286  B.C. 

XVI.  PRINCES  OF  CH’ON 

Ch’on  was  a small  central  state  near  the  present  K’ai-fong-fu,  ad- 
joining the  state  of  Sung  in  the  south.  Its  line  of  princes  is  headed 


APPENDIX 


343 


by  a supposed  descendant  from  the  emperor  Shun  raised  to  rank 
by  Wu-wang  as  Duke  Hu.  His  successors  were  named  Short, 
Slang,  Hiau,  and  Shon,  who  again  was  followed  by 

B.C. 


Duke 

Yu 

. 854-832 

U 

Hi 

. 831-796 

Wu 

. 795-781 

u 

I 

. 780-778 

P’ing 

. 777-755 

u 

W on 

. 754-745 

u 

Huan 

. 744-707 

u 

Li 

. 706-700 

({ 

Chuang  . 

. 699-693 

u 

Suan 

. 692-648 

u 

Mu 

. 647-632 

u 

Kung 

. 631-614 

ll 

Ling 

. 613-599 

u 

Ch’dng  . 

. 598-569 

u 

Ai 

. 568-530 

u 

Hui 

. 529-506 

u 

Huai 

. 505-502 

“ Min 

Ch’dn  was  annexed  by  Ch’u 

in  478  B.C. 

. 501-478 

XVII.  PRINCES  OF  TS’AU 


Ts’au  was  a small  state  wedged  in  between  Sung  and  Lu  in  the 
southeast  of  the  present  Shan-tung  province.  Its  line  of  princes 
is  headed  by  Chon-to,  a brother  of  Wu-wang.  His  successors  were 
T’ai-po,  Chung-kiXn,  and  the  counts  Kung  and  Hiau,  followed  by 


Count  I 
“ Yu 
“ Tai 
“ Hui 
Duke  Mu 
“ Huan 


. 864-835 
. 834-826 
. 825-796 
. 795-760 
. 759-757 
. 756-702 


344 


APPENDIX 


Duke  Chuang  

“Hi 

“ Chau  

“ Kung 

“ Won 

“ SiXan 

“ Ch’ong 

“ Wu 

“ P’ing 

“ Tau 

“ Siang 

“ Yin 

“ Tsing 

Prince  Po-yang  .... 
Ts’au  was  annexed  by  Sung  in  487  b.c. 


B.C. 

701-671 

670-662 

661-653 

652-618 

617-595 

594-578 

577-555 

554-528 

527-524 

523-515 

514-510 

509-506 

505-502 

501-487 


XVIII.  PPJNCES  OF  CHONG 


Chong  was  a centrally  situated  state  adjoining  the  imperial  terri- 
tory of  Chou  on  the  east,  in  the  present  Ho-nan  province.  It  was 
created  in  806  b.c.  by  Siian-wang  as  a fief  for  his  younger  brother 
Yu,  who  thereby  became 


Duke  Huan  . 

“ Wu  . 

“ Chuang 
“ Li  (usurper 
“ Chau  . 
Tzi-wn 
Tzi-ying 
Duke  Li 
“ Won  . 

“ Mu  . 

“ Ling  . 

“ Siang  . 

“ Tau  . 

“ Ch’ong 


806-771 

770-744 

743-701 

700-697 

696-695 

694 

693-680 

679-673 

672-628 

627-606 

605 

604-587 

586-585 

584-571 


APPENDIX 


345 


Duke  Hi 

B.C. 

570-566 

<< 

Kien  . 

565-530 

U 

Ting  . 

529-514 

U 

Hien  . 

513-501 

<< 

Shong 

500-464 

u 

Ai 

463-456 

u 

Kung  . 

455-424 

u 

Yu  . 

423-... 

u 

Sil 

422-396 

u 

K’ang 

395-375 

Chong  was  auuexed  by  Han  in  375  u.c. 

XIX.  PRINCES  OF  TS’AI 


Ts*ai  was  a small  state  adjoining  Chong  and  Sung  on 

the  south 

and  Ch’on  on  the  west, 
of  Wu-wang. 

Its  first  prince,  Tu,  was  a younger  brother 

Ts’ai-shu  Tu 

. about  1122,  then  banished 

Ts’ai  Chung-hu  . 

1107-1054 

Ts’ai-po 

1053-948 

Marquis  Kung 

947-894 

“ Hi,  or  Li 

893-845 

“ Wu  . . 

846-838 

“I  . 

837-810 

“ Hi  . 

809-762 

“ Kung  . 

761-760 

“ Tai 

759-750 

“ SiXan 

749-715 

“ Huan 

714-695 

“ Ai  . 

694-675 

“ Mu 

674-646 

“ Chuang  . 

645-612 

“ Won 

611-592 

“ King 

591-543 

“ Ling 

542-531 

“ P’ing  . 

529-522 

“ Tau 

521-519 

346 


APPENDIX 


B.C. 

Marquis  Chau 518-491 

“ Ch’ong 490-472 

“ Shong  471-457 

“ Yuan 456-451 

“ Ts’i  450-447 


Ts’ai  was  annexed  by  Ch’u  in  447  b.c. 

XX.  PRINCES  OF  WEI 

The  small  state  of  Wei  on  the  banks  of  the  Yellow  River  about 
the  present  Wei-hui-fu  in  Ho-nan  should  not  be  confounded  with 
the  bigger  Wei  state  farther  west,  comprising  lower  Shan-si  and  part 
of  Ho-nan  and  being  one  of  the  three  states  into  which  Tsin  was 
divided  since  376  b.c.  Its  first  prince  was  a younger  brother  of 
Wu-wang,  Fong,  prince  of  K’ang. 


K’ang  (eleventh  century) 


Count  K’ang  . 

1078-1053 

“ K’au,  or  Hiau 

1052-1017 

“ Ssi 

1016-  935 

“ Tsie  . 

. 934-910 

“ Tsing  . 

. 909-895 

“ Chon 

. 894-867 

Marquis  K’ing 

. 866-855 

“Hi  . 

. 854-813 

Duke  Wu 

. 812-758 

“ Chuang  . 

. 757-735 

“ Huan 

. 734-719 

“ Shan 

. 718-700 

“ Hui 

. 1 699-696 
1688-669 

K’ien-mdu  (usurper) 

. 696-688 

Duke  I . 

. 668-661 

“ Tai 

. 660 

“ Won  . 

. 659-635 

“ Ch’ong  . 

. 634-600 

“ Mu 

. 599-589 

“ Ting  . 

. 

. 588-577 

APPENDIX 


347 


Duke  Hien 

. 

B.c. 

[576-559 

“ Shang  (intermediate) 

546-544 

558-547 

“ Siang 

• 

543-535 

“ Ling 

* 

534^493 

“ Ch’u 

• 

[492-481 

“ Chuang  (intermediate) 

[476-469 

480-478 

Lord  K’i  (intermediate)  . 

• 

477 

Duke  Tau 

, 

468-451 

“ King 

. 

450-432 

“ Chau 

* 

431-426 

“ Huai  . 

425-415 

“ Shon  . 

, 

414-373 

“ Shong  . 

• 

372-362 

Marquis  Ch’dng 

361-333 

“ P’ing 

. 

332-325 

Lord  Ssi 

, 

324-283 

“ Huai 

282-253 

“ Yuan 

* 

252-230 

“ Kio 

229-209 

This  state  of  Wei  was  the  only  one  that  actually  survived  to  the 
foundation  of  Ts’in-shi-huang-ti’s  ascension  to  the  throne  of  the 
empire.  Lord  Kio  had  been  allowed  his  title,  but  was  reduced  to 
the  position  of  a private  citizen  in  209  b.c. 

XXL  PRINCES  OF  WU 

The  legendary  origin  of  the  state  of  Wu,  which  occupied  the  ter- 
ritories on  and  near  the  shores  of  the  Yang-tzi  at  its  mouth,  is 
referred  to  T’ai-po,  the  eldest  son  of  T’an-ju,  Duke  of  Chou,  and 
therefore  Won-wang’s  uncle,  who,  being  excluded  from  his  legitimate 
right  of  succession  to  the  ducal  throne,  became  an  exile  in  this 
distant  region  and  the  alleged  ancestor  of  its  line  of  princes.  There 
are  names  mentioned  down  to  the  time  when  Wu  became  better 
known  in  Chinese  history,  but  the  entire  genealogy  with  its  chro- 
nology is  uncertain  till  585  b.c. 


348 


APPENDIX 


B.C. 

Prince  Sh6u-mdng 585-561 

“ Chu-fan 560-548 

“ Yu-chai 547-544 

“ I-ma 543-527 

King  Liau 526-515 

“ Ho-lu 514-496 

“ Fu-ch’ai 495-473 


Wu  was  annexed  by  Yiie  in  473  b.c. 


XXII.  KINGS  OF  YtiE 

The  kingdom  of  Yiie,  during  the  Chou  period,  occupied  about 
the  present  province  of  Ch’o-kiang.  Although  Yii4  is  mentioned 
as  a state  as  early  as  601  b.c.  in  the  Tso-chuan  (Legge,  Ch’un-ts’iu, 
p.  302),  its  history  as  known  to  us  begins  with  its  king  K6u-tsiin 


fully  a century  later. 

King  Kou-tsien  ........  496-465 

“ Lu-ying  ........  464-  459 

“ Pu-shdu 458-449 

“ Chu-kou 448-412 

“ I and  his  successors 411-334 

Yiie  was  annexed  by  Ch’u  in  334  b.c. 


INDEX 


Agreements,  state  : see  Contracts. 

Agriculture : introduction  of,  as- 

cribed to  Shon-nung,  10 ; im- 
proved by  Huang-ti,  13  ; during 
Ch6u  dynasty  according  to 
the  Chdu-li,  110;  in  charge  of 
Mandarin  of  Earth,  113;  Huns 
have  no  regular,  168 ; Hii 
King’s  theory  regarding,  re- 
futed by  Mencius,  290 ; taxation 
of,  296-298 ; see  also  Irriga- 
tion OF  Soil;  Landholders; 
Land  Tenure. 

Altruism  : see  Mo  Ti. 

Amazons,  corps  of : under  Ho-lu, 

King  of  Wu,  234. 

Ambassadors  : from  the  Yii6-ch’ang 
tribes,  127  ; see  also  Diplomats. 

Amiot,  Father ; first  to  point  out 
identity  of  echpse  referred  to 
in  Shi-king,  174. 

Ancestors  : merits  of,  become  a bene- 
fit to  descendants,  82 ; cause 
descendants  to  be  rewarded  as 
fief-holders,  99  ; Ch6u-kung  prays 
to,  and  not  to  God,  for  the  re- 
covery of  Wu-wang,  102-103; 
have  charge  in  Heaven  of  de- 
scendants on  earth,  103  ; Ch6u- 
kung’s  prayer  to,  reveals  his 
loyalty,  105 ; see  also  Sacrifice 
to  Ancestors  ; Spirits  of 
the  Departed. 

Antiquity,  monuments  of : none 

comparable  to  those  of  Egypt, 
77. 

An-wang,  the  Emperor : 273-274, 
332. 

Archieologists,  Chinese  : trustworthi- 
ness of,  50,  71-73,  74. 

Archives,  state  : 125. 

Arendt,  C. ; his  chronological  tables. 


7,  note  2,  52,  note  2,  174,  note  1, 
175;  on  the  mother  of  Mencius, 
283,  note  1,  329,  note  1. 

Army ; beginnings  under  Huang-ti, 
22 ; no  standing,  at  beginning 
of  Ch6u  dynasty,  119;  with  all 
accoutrements  marched  30  K 
(10  miles,  or  less)  a day,  159, 
165 ; characteristics  of,  compiled 
from  the  Shi-king,  158-166; 
infantry  composed  of  husband- 
men, 163 ; regimental  divisions 
and  “chariots,”  163-164 ; train- 
ing before  the  battle,  165 ; cav- 
alry introduced  by  King  Wu- 
ling  of  Chau,  272-273 ; see  also 
Chariots  ; Horses  ; War  ; 
Weapons. 

Arrow-heads : see  Weapons. 

Art : works  of,  destroyed  and  con- 
cealed under  Shi-huang-ti,  re- 
discovered in  periods  of  renais- 
sance; early  collectors  of,  71; 
during  Shang  djmasty  chiefly 
symbolic,  84 ; Confucian  age 
responsible  for  forgeries  in,  90 ; 
autochthonous,  during  Shang 
dynasty,  91 ; objects  of,  and 
handicraft  described  in  Chdu-li, 
126 ; see  also  Archeologists  ; 
Bronze  Drums  ; Bronzes  ; 
Dragon  and  Phenix  ; Hiero- 
glyphics ; Jade  ; Nine  Tripods, 
THE  ; Pa-kua  ; Pottery  ; T ’au- 
t’ie;  Thunder  Pattern  ; Writ- 
ing, ART  OF. 

Artisans : rank  fifth  in  population, 

110. 

Astrologers,  duties  of : 118. 

Astronomers,  duties  of:  118. 

Astronomy  : practised  by  Huang-ti, 
13,  21-22 ; progress  in,  under 


349 


350 


INDEX 


Chuan-hii,  25 ; Hi  and  Ho, 
astronomers  under  Yau,  30; 
under  Chung-k’ang  Hi  and  Ho 
fail  to  predict  eclipse  of  sun,  39- 
40  ; eclipse  recorded  in  the  Shu- 
king,  40-41,  174;  “a  conjunc- 
tion of  five  planets,”  54;  “two 
suns  appeared  together,”  55; 
duties  of  officers  in  charge  of, 
118-119;  use  of  gnomon,  119; 
eclipse  of  776  b.c.,  foreboding 
disaster,  confirmed  by  Western 
savants,  172-175;  eclipse  of 
694  B.C.,  201. 

Attila,  King  of  the  Huns : his  an- 
cestors among  the  sovereigns 
of  the  Hiung-nu  nation,  185- 
186,  190. 

Autiunn,  Mandarin  of  {ts’iu-kuan)  : 
113,  123-125. 

Avalokites’vara : 149. 

Bactria : 148. 

Badge  of  jade  (Jcui)  ; 103. 

Baggage,  army : watched  by  the 

feeble  during  battle,  164. 

Baghatur  (“hero”),  probable  Turk- 
ish form  of  the  name  Mau-tun : 
185. 

Bak  tribes  : T.  de  Lacouperie’s,  15. 

Bamboo  Books,  the  : chief  authority 
on  Yu’s  successors,  41 ; and  on 
the  Shang  dynasty,  50 ; dis- 
covery of,  50;  their  chronolog}^ 
differs  from  that  of  other 
sources,  51,  175-176,  329,  note 
1 ; their  account  of  the  Shang  dy- 
nasty dry  as  compared  to  the 
Shu-king’s  model  emperor  chap- 
ters, 52 ; specimen  from,  on 
Ch6u-sin,  53-55 ; Chavannes, 
Legge,  and  Biot  on,  51,  note  1 ; 
throw  light  on  Shang  culture, 
76 ; on  Mu-wang  and  Si-wang- 
mu,  144-145,  148;  mention 

visit  of  Si-wang-mu  to  Em- 
peror Shun,  150-151 ; on  the 
Kung-ho  period,  157. 

Bamboo  roots : as  modern  instru- 
ments of  divination,  83. 

Bamboo  tablets : see  Writing,  art 

OF. 


Battles,  Important : Wu-wang  de- 
feats Ch6u-sin  [at  Mu-y4],  65 ; 
between  Chinese  and  Tartar 
armies  mostly  in  North  Shan-si 
and  Ordos  territory,  122 ; of 
Ts’i6n-m6u,  789  b.c.,  158 ; 

against  the  Huns  under  Suan- 
wang,  827  b.c.,  158-161 ; sea- 
sons and  mode  of  procedure, 
164—165 ; mode  of  fighting 
among  the  Huns,  168,  189  ; Tso- 
chuan  describes  battle  of  714 
B.C.,  187-188 ; between  Ts’i  and 
Ch’u,  208-209 ; between  Tsin 
and  Ch’u  at  Ch’ong-p’u,  216 ; be- 
tween Simg  and  Ch’u,  219 ; Tsin 
and  Chong  beaten  by  Ch’u,  223 ; 
between  Wu  and  Yu6,  233,  234, 
261 ; five  confederate  states 
beaten  by  Ts’in  at  the  Han-ku 
Pass,  313 ; Po  K’i  of  Ts’in 
crushes  Han  and  Wei  at  I-k’u6, 
318;  Po  K’i  takes  the  city  of 
Hang-tang,  321 ; Ts’in  de- 
feated at  siege  of  Han-tan, 
322;  Ts’in ’s  victories  in  256 
and  249  b.c.,  325 ; Ts’in  de- 
feated in  247  B.C.,  its  final 
engagements  against  federal 
states,  328. 

Beacon  fires ; lighted  as  signals  of 
alarm,  172,  176-177. 

Beasts  : not  hostile  to  man  in  pri- 
meval period,  4. 

Bibhcal  names  at  the  head  of  King 
Attila ’s  genealogical  table  ; 186, 
190-191. 

Biot,  fidouard  : on  Yu’s  engineering 
exploits,  34,  36-38 ; his  trans- 
lation of  Bamboo  Books,  51, 
note  1 ; of  the  Chdu-li,  108 ; con- 
siders immutability  of  govern- 
ment based  on  that  of  individual 
life,  109 ; extracts  from  his  notes 
on  the  customs  of  the  ancient 
Chinese  collected  from  the  Shi- 
king,  162-166. 

Boards,  the  Six  (liu-pu),  of  modern 
times  : correspond  to  six  cate- 
gories of  the  Chdu-li,  HI; 
basis  of  classification  of  official 
work,  113. 


INDEX 


351 


Boians,  the : like  the  Hivmg-nu,  con- 
verted skulls  into  drinking  ves- 
sels, 271-272. 

Boots  ; when  introduced,  272. 

Botany : research  in,  ascribed  to 

Shon-nung,  10-11. 

Bows  and  arrows  : see  Weapons. 

Bretschneider,  E. ; quoting  passage 
on  Shon-nung ’s  botany,  11. 

Brigands  : Mandarin  of  Autumn  in 
charge  of,  123. 

Bronze  age,  the,  in  China ; 236. 

“Bronze  drum  nations”  : 195;  com- 
prise elements  of  different  aflini- 
ties,  196. 

Bronze  drums : manufacture  of,  at 
Canton,  a family  secret,  117 ; 
of  the  Man  barbarians,  195-196 ; 
emblems  found  among  the  or- 
naments of,  196. 

Bronzes  : copper  mine  discovered  by 
Huang-ti  supposed  to  have  fur- 
nished oldest,  23,  90,  236 ; of 
the  Shang  and  Ch6u  dynasties 
destroyed,  buried,  and  immured, 
under  Shi-huang-ti  and  later  on 
rediscovered ; difficulty  of  fix- 
ing age  of,  71,  77 ; personal 
names  in  legends  of  Shang,  72 ; 
private  collections  of,  73 ; sac- 
rificial, and  bells  the  only  wit- 
nesses of  high  antiquity,  77 ; 
have  become  models  in  ceramic 
and  jade  industries,  84,  91 ; 
alloys  of,  according  to  the  Chdu- 
li,  126 ; the  tripod  of  812  b.c., 
161 ; swords  still  in  use  about 
500  B.C.,  235 ; see  also  Bronze 
Drums  ; Nine  Tripods,  the. 

Bucklers : 164. 

Burnouf,  E. : on  Si-wang-mu,  151, 
note  2. 

Bushell,  S.  W. ; on  “The  Stone 
Drums  of  the  Ch6u  Dynasty,” 
171. 

Calendar : supposed  to  have  been 
introduced  by  Fu-hi,  9,  14 ; 
developed  by  Huang-ti,  21,  22 ; 
by  Chuan-hii,  25 ; by  Wu-wang, 
98 ; see  also  Cyclical  Char- 
acters. 


Carriages,  Cars,  and  Carts : see 

Chariots. 

Cassini,  D. ; on  the  Shur-king  eclipse, 
41. 

Cattigara : the  terminus  of  western 
na\’igation,  127. 

Cattle-breeding ; see  Flocks. 

“Censer,”  the  term:  wrongly  ap- 
plied to  bronzes  of  the  Shang 
and  Ch6u  dynasties,  84. 

Censors,  public  {yu-shi)  : officers 

performing  duties  similar  to 
those  of,  116. 

Censorship,  public : evil  effects  of 
too  much,  155. 

Census  of  population:  119. 

Ceremonial : love  of,  predominates 
long  before  Confucius,  83-84, 
230,  241 ; holds  together  Ch6u 
d5masty,  109;  in  emperor’s 
personal  fife,  115;  in  charge  of 
Mandarin  of  Spring,  118;  Con- 
fucius exaggerates  fimeral,  230, 
244 ; the  people  of  Chung-tu 
educated  by  strict,  244-245 ; 
Confucius’  personal  life  regu- 
lated by,  256—257 ; Chuang-tzi 
despises,  304. 

Ceremonies,  Board  of  : 113,  117-119. 

Chalfant,  F.  H.  : on  early  Chinese 
writing,  74,  note  1. 

Chalmers,  John : on  the  Shu-king 
eclipse,  41 ; his  year  dates  b.c. 
differ  from  those  of  astronomers, 
174. 

Chan-kuo:  see  Contending  States, 

THE. 

Chan-kuo-ts’d : 262,264. 

Chang  Hong,  the  astronomer : 129, 
135. 

Chang  I,  statesman : pupil  of  Kui- 
ku-tzi,  285,  286,  308 ; his  career, 
311-314;  K’ti  Yuan  warns  king 
of  Ch’u  against,  315-316 ; dies 
as  minister  in  Wei,  316. 

Chang  K’i6n,  the  general : 147,  148. 

Chang  Yii-si : on  Shon-nung ’s  bot- 
any, 11. 

Ch’ang-an : old  capital,  seat  of  col- 
lectors of  ancient  bronzes,  73. 

Ch’ang,  Duke  of  Ch6u : see  Won- 

WANG. 


352 


INDEX 


Ch’ang-sha  (Hu-nan)  ; burial  place 
of  Shon-nung,  11. 

Chaos  : social,  before  Fu-hi,  9,  14. 

Charioteers ; 163. 

Chariots  {ch’d  or  ku) : drawn  by 
oxen  under  Huang-ti,  22 ; word 
for,  occurs  among  oldest  hiero- 
glyphics, 75 ; south-pointing, 
127-136 ; used  in  war  against 
the  Huns,  159-160,  163,  273; 
“chariot”  as  a collective  name, 
163 ; outfit  of  war,  163-164 ; 
baggage  cars  drawn  by  oxen, 
164 ; chief  officer’s,  had  ox-tail 
pennon,  165 ; fighting  on  char- 
iots against  foot-soldiers  a dis- 
advantage to  the  Chinese,  187 ; 
a technical  term  in  population 
statistics,  203 ; had  parts  of 
iron  in  seventh  century  b.c., 
204. 

Chau,  Ch’ong-wang’s  son  : see  K’ang- 

WANG. 

Chau ; city  in  the  present  South 
Shan-si,  269. 

Chau,  Duke  of  Lu : 230,  243-244, 
341. 

Chau,  Marquis  of  Tsin : appoints 
his  imcle  lord  of  K’u-wu,  334. 

Chau  Sho,  commander  in  Chau  : 319. 

Chau  Sho,  son  of  Chau  Tun  : 269. 

Chau-siang,  king  of  Ts’in  : 317-325, 
333 ; under  the  regency  of  his 
mother  with  Wei  Jan  as  chan- 
cellor, 317-319 ; sole  regent  with 
Fan  Tsu  as  chancellor,  320-325 ; 
practically  “Son  of  Heaven,” 
offers  sacrifice  to  Shang-ti,  326. 

Chau  Siang-tzi : son  of,  and  marries 
Tartar  woman,  269 ; uses  skull 
of  enemy  for  drinking  vessel, 
270. 

Chau,  the  state  of  : beginnings,  263  ; 
confirmed  as  a feudal  state,  264  ; 
one  of  the  “Seven  Heroes” 
states,  266 ; thoroughfare  for 
northern  tribes,  267  ; its  princes 
favor  Tartar  customs,  269-273, 
316 ; common  descent  with 
princes  of  Ts’in,  grow  in  power 
by  gifts  of  territory,  269 ; its 
cMef  Chau  Siang-tzi,  son  of,  and 


married  to,  Tartar  woman,  269 ; 
and  changes  enemy’s  skull  into 
a drinking  vessel,  270-272;  its 
history  full  of  supernatural 
accoimts,  270;  joins  confed- 
eration against  Ts’in,  310;  head- 
quarters of  Su  Ts’in,  represent- 
ing the  “Six  States,”  311,  313; 
attacked  by  Ts’i  and  Wei,  313 ; 
kingdom  since  329  b.c.,  315;  de- 
feated by,  and  repulses  Ts’in, 
319  ; defeated  by  Ts’in  at  Shang- 
tang,  321 ; P’ing-yuan-kiin, 
a prince  of,  321 ; Han-tan, 
capital  of,  besieged  by  Ts’in, 
322 ; Prince  I-jon  of  Ts’in  at 
the  court  of,  323-325 ; defeated 
by  Ts’in,  325;  annexed  by 
Ts’in,  328,  336 ; princes  of,  336. 

Chau  Tsui,  companion  of  Duke  Won 
and  prime  minister  of  Tsin : 
220,  269. 

Chau  Tim,  minister  in  Tsin:  220, 
269. 

Chau-wang,  the  Emperor : 143,  189, 
331. 

Chau  Wu,  son  of  Chau  Sho  ; subject 
of  a historical  drama,  269. 

Ch’au,  the  Emperor  King^-wang’s 
brother  ; flees  to  Ch’u,  233. 

Ch  ’au-ye-ts  ’i&n-tsai : 132. 

Chavannes,  Edouard : on  trust- 

worthiness of  Chinese  history 
previous  to  Ch6u-sin,  55-56 ; 
on  dragons  and  phenixes,  88 ; 
on  Si-wang-mu,  151 ; on  the 
“Stone  Drums  of  the  Ch6u 
Dynasty,”  171;  on  Ts’in  and 
Ch’u  as  non-Chinese  states,  267- 
268 ; on  the  supernatural  ele- 
ment in  history  of  Chau  state, 
270 ; on  skulls  changed  into 
drinking  vessels,  271 ; see  also 
Shi-ki  and  Wu-chi-shan-tombs. 

Chi  : see  Robber  Chi'. 

Chi,  the  Emperor : see  Ti-chi. 

Chi-nan : term  for  the  magnetic 

needle,  used  metaphorically,  129, 
135. 

Chi  Po,  official  of  Tsin : opposes  the 
San-Tsin,  270. 

Ch’i-yu  : rebel  under  Huang-ti,  20. 


INDEX 


353 


Chinchew  (Zaitun) ; 132. 

Chon-ting-wang,  the  Emperor : 263, 
332. 

Chon-to,  brother  of  Wu-wang : in- 
vested with  Ts’au,  343. 

Ch’on,  the  city  of : capital  of  the 
Emperor  Fu-hi,  9. 

Ch’on,  the  state  of : on  side  of  Ch’u 
in  war  with  Tsin,  216 ; descend- 
ants of  its  house  become  sover- 
eigns of  Ts’i,  273 ; princes  of, 
342-343. 

Ch’on  Chung,  ascetic : 289-290. 

Chong,  ante-nuptial  son  of  Prince 
I-jon  of  Ts’in  : 324-325  ; crown- 
prince  and  King  of  Ts’in,  327- 
328,  334 ; see  also  Shi-huang-ti. 

Chong,  the  state  of : attacked  by 
Jung  tribes,  187 ; travelers 
from  Ts’i  to  Ch’u  passed,  214 ; 
the  Emperor  Siang-wang  a 
fugitive  in,  216,  219 ; on  the 
side  of  Ch’u  in  war  with  Tsin, 
216;  under  the  supremacy  of 
Ch’u,  223 ; of  Tsin,  227 ; its 
minister  Tzi-ch’an,  232;  con- 
quered by  Han,  274,  345  ; Siian- 
wang  invests  his  brother  Yu 
with,  344;  princes  of,  344-345. 

Ch’6ng-ki  (Kan-su)  : birthplace  of 
the  Emperor  Fu-hi,  8. 

Ch’ong-p’u:  city  near  the  present 
Ts’au-ch6u  in  Shan-tung,  216, 
219. 

Ch’ong-t’ang,  the  Emperor : de- 

scendant of  Ti-k’u,  25 ; over- 
throws the  Hia  dynasty  under 
Ki6,  44,  47 ; founder  of  the 
Shang  dynasty,  47,  330 ; his 
benevolence  toward  animals,  47  ; 
his  successors,  47-57 ; referred 
to  as  an  ancestor  by  the  Em- 
peror P’an-kong,  82;  system  of 
taxation  imder,  297. 

Ch’ong-wang,  the  Emperor : 104- 

107,  136-138,  331 ; appoints 
Ch6u-sin’s  stepbrother,  Wei-tzi, 
prince  of  the  empire,  106-107, 
341 ; receives  ambassadors  from 
the  Yii6-ch’ang  tribes,  126-128 ; 
moves  capital  to  Lo-yang,  136 ; 
his  death,  138 ; invests  Hiimg  I 
2a 


with  territory  of  Man  barbari- 
ans, 190,  192,  336 ; fixes  the 
Nine  Tripods  and  prognosti- 
cates duration  of  dynasty,  222 ; 
wall  painting  representing,  with 
his  guardian  Ch6u-kung,  243 ; 
invests  younger  brother  with 
Tsin,  266,  334;  see  also  Chou- 

KUNG. 

Ch6u : dukes  of,  descendants  of 
Ti-k’u  and  his  posthumous  son 
H6u-tsi,  25,  26;  early  history 
of,  57-58 ; causes  tending  to 
develop  influence  of  ducal  state, 
69,  183;  Wu-wang  twelve  years 
duke  of,  97 ; ancestors  of,  said 
to  have  adopted  Hunnic  life, 
168,  169 ; chronology,  331 ; 

T’an-fu,  Duke  of,  see  T’an-fu; 
Ch’ang,  Duke  of,  see  Won- 
WANG ; Ki-li,  Duke  of,  see  Ki-ni ; 
Fa,  Duke  of,  see  Wu-wanq; 
Tan,  Diike  of,  see  Chou-kung; 
dukes  of,  descendants  of  Ch6u- 
kung  : a minister  under  Chau- 
wang,  143 ; the  co-regent  during 
the  Kimg-ho  period  and  min- 
ister to  Siian-wang,  157 ; Hei- 
ki6n,  Duke  of,  imder  Chuang- 
wang,  201. 

Ch6u  dynasty:  93-328,  331-332. 

Chou-kuan:  original  title  of  the 

Ch6u-li,  110. 

Ch6u-kung ; fourth  son  of  Won- 
wang,  58 ; addresses  ancestors 
in  prayer  for  Wu-wang ’s  fife, 
81,  102-103 ; practised  divina- 
tion, 83 ; soul  of  Wu-wang’s 
government,  79-103 ; becomes 
fief-holder  of  K’ii-f6u  (Lu), 
99-100,  340 ; thinks  fate  is 
directed  by  God,  one’s  ancestors 
and  oneself,  101-102 ; is  aware 
of  his  abihty,  103 ; becomes 
Ch’ong-wang ’s  guardian,  but 
to  meet  the  intrigues  of  his 
brothers  keeps  away  from  court, 
writing  extension  of  I-king,  104 ; 
an  ode  in  Sh'i-king  ascribed  to, 
his  loyalty  revealed,  105 ; de- 
feats his  enemies,  106  ; organizer 
of  Ch6u  government;  supposed 


354 


INDEX 


author  of  the  Chdu-li,  107 ; 
presents  ambassadors  with  south- 
pointing chariots,  127,  128 ; his 
death  and  eulogy,  137-138 ; a 
wall  painting  representing,  and 
Confucius’  veneration  for,  243. 

Chdu-li,  the : authorship  ascribed 

to  Ch6u-kung,  107,  138 ; Chu 
Hi  on,  108 ; serves  as  a model  of 
government  and  culture  for 
later  periods,  translated  by 
iSdouard  Biot,  108 ; traces  of 
statistical  method,  developed  by 
Kuan-tzi,  found  in,  119,  202; 
a mine  of  information,  126 ; its 
geography  compared  to  that 
of  Ch’un-ts’iu,  182 ; as  com- 
pared to  Li-ki,  252-253 ; its 
statutes  cramped  by  Tartar  in- 
fluences, 270. 

Chdu-shu,  65. 

Ch6u-sin  : last  emperor  of  the  Shang 
dynasty,  53-57,  331 ; his  wicked- 
ness described  in  the  SM-ki,  56 ; 
Legge’s  recapitulation  of  Shu- 
king  commentaries  on,  56-57 ; 
punishment  of  roasting  is  his 
invention,  57,  note  1 ; obeys  his 
wife  Ta-ki,  56,  65 ; his  renewed 
crimes  lead  to  his  ruin,  63-65 ; 
his  godlessness  and  incapacity 
emphasized  by  Wu-wang,  64 ; 
his  death,  65 ; his  minister 
Shang  Jung  becomes  Wu-wang’s 
assistant,  95 ; disposal  of  his 
treasures,  97 ; loses  the  Nine 
Tripods,  222 ; Yang  Chu  thinks 
Ch6u-sin’s  a happy  life,  278. 

Chdu:  term  meaning  “a  province” 
in  ancient  times,  21. 

Ch6u,  the  imperial  dominion : Su 
Ts’in  native  of,  309;  see  also 
Emperor,  the. 

Christian  principles  in  Mo  Ti’s 
philosophy  : 282. 

Chronological  Tables : 329-348. 

Chronology : discrepancies  in  early, 
7,  note  2 ; of  early  sovereigns 
fixed  by  later  generations,  49 ; 
the  standard,  and  that  of  the 
Bamboo  Books,  51,  175-176; 
imcertain  previous  to  Chou 


dynasty,  52 ; beyond  dispute 
in  case  of  eclipse  of  776  b.c.,  175. 

Chu  Hi,  the  philosopher ; on  the 
Chdu-li,  108 ; on  the  early  em- 
perors of  the  Ch6u  dynasty, 
158-159 ; causes  commentary 
of  the  T’ung-kidn-kang-mu  to 
be  compiled,  264;  on  the  origin 
of  the  tsing  system  of  taxation, 
297 ; defends  Confucianism,  302. 

Chu-hdu  (“Princes  of  the  Empire”), 
96,  99 ; Wei-tzi  appointed  a, 
106 ; subject  to  same  ceremonial 
as  the  emperor,  115;  the  chiefs 
of  Han,  Chau,  and  Wei  ap- 
pointed, 264. 

Chu-shu-ki^idn : see  Bamboo  Books. 

Chu  Tan  : a leader  in  war  against 
Jung  tribes,  188. 

Chu,  the  state  of  : 188. 

Chu  Yii  (eleventh  century  a.d.)  : 
first  author  to  refer  to  use  of 
compass  on  sliipboard,  133,  136. 

Ch’u,  Duke  of  Wei : 248,  347. 

Ch’u,  the  state  of  : Chau-wang’s  war 
against,  143 ; becomes  powerful 
under  P’ing-wang,  178;  causes 
of  its  growth,  182,  189 ; called 
“the  south”  by  Ssi-ma  Ts’i6n; 
called  “King”  in  the  Ch’un- 
ts’iu,  189 ; its  sovereigns,  189- 
192 ; its  old  capitals  Tan-yang 
and  Ying,  190 ; kings  of,  call 
themselves  “Man  barbarians,” 
191 ; its  king  Chuang  one  of 
the  “Five  Leaders,”  206,  221, 
222;  expedition  of  Ts’i  against, 
208-209 ; federal  states  in  fear 
of,  208;  Duke  Won  of  Tsin’s 
good  treatment  in,  214 ; products 
of,  214;  defeated  by  Tsin  in 
battle  of  Ch’ong-p’u,  216,  219; 
defeats  Ts’i,  219 ; successful 
war  of,  against  Hunnic  tribes ; 
insults  imperial  dignity,  221 ; 
Lau-tzi  a native  of,  231,  269; 
King'*-wang ’s  brother  Ch  ’au  seeks 
refuge  in,  233 ; a king  of,  in- 
quires about  iron  swords,  235 ; 
Confucius’ sojourn  in,  247 ; con- 
quers middle  states,  263 ; one 
of  the  “Seven  Heroes”  states, 


INDEX 


355 


266 ; its  population,  267 ; non- 
Chinese  character  of,  267-268 ; 
Wu  K’i  chancellor  in,  274 ; 
princes  of,  known  for  luxury, 
277,  note  1;  Hii  Hing,  “the 
agriculturist,”  a native  of,  290; 
Chuang-tzi  declines  post  of 
prime  minister  in,  299 ; joins 
confederation  against  Ts’in,  310 ; 
Chang  I ill-treated  by,  311,  312; 
Chang  I’s  successful  comt  in- 
trigue in,  312,  315 ; since  con- 
quest of  Yii6  possesses  whole 
south  of  China;  chief  rival  of 
Ts’in,  314;  first  to  claim  king’s 
crown  among  federal  states, 
315;  K’ii  Yiian,  the  poet  of, 
315-316 ; Wei  Jan,  a native  of,  as 
chancellor  of  Ts’in  does  his 
country  much  harm,  317  ; de- 
feated by  Ts’in ; its  capital  taken 
and  kings’  mausolea  destroyed, 
319;  Huang  Hi6,  chief  minister 
of,  321-322,  325 ; capital  of, 
removed  to  Wu  (Soochow),  322  ; 
makes  conquests  in  Lu,  326; 
and  conquers  it,  341 ; annexed 
by  Ts’in,  328,  338 ; Princes  of, 
336-338 ; see  also  Man  bar- 
barians. 

Ch’u-tz’i,  “the  Ch’u  Elegies  ” : 316. 

Chuan-hii,  the  Emperor  : 24,  25,  329  ; 
ancestor  of  Yii  and  Shun,  25 ; 
and  of  the  Kings  of  Ch’u,  189. 

Chuang,  King  of  Ch’u : fifth  among 
the  Five  Leaders,  221,  222,  337. 

Chuang-siang,  King  of  Ts’in 
(= Prince  I-jon),  323-328,  334; 
an  exile  in  Chau,  323 ; becomes 
heir  apparent,  marries  Lii  Pu- 
wei’s  wife,  324;  as  king  of  Ts’in 
appoints  Lii  Pu-wei  prime  min- 
ister, 327 ; his  death  possibly 
caused  by  Lii  Pu-wel,  328. 

Ch’un-shon-kiin  (Huang  Hid),  one 
of  the  “Four  Nobles,”  321; 
at  the  siege  of  Han-tan,  322 ; 
patronizes  Siin  K’uang,  325. 

Ch’unr-ts’iu : the  “Spring  and  Au- 
tumn Annals,”  by  Confucius, 
a chronological  account  of  the 
state  of  Lu,  722  to  481  b.c.,  179, 


197,  253,  340;  doubts  as  to 
authorship,  180;  its  geography, 
181-197 ; calls  the  Ch’u  state 
“King,”  189;  its  extent,  197, 
262;  records  eclipse  of  the  sim 
in  694  B.C.,  201. 

Chuang-tzi  (the  book) : 299-305. 

Chuang-tzi,  the  philosopher : on 

the  Kung-ho  period,  157 ; refers 
to  Lid-tzi,  277 ; his  character 
and  work,  299-308 ; better  ex- 
ponent of  Tauism  than  Lau-tzi 
himself,  300 ; extracts  from 
Giles’  work  on,  300-301 ; at- 
tacks Confucius  and  his  school, 
302;  the  satires  “Robber  Chi” 
and  “The  Old  Fisherman,’! 
302-305. 

Chuang-wang,  the  Emperor : 201- 
218,  332. 

Chung,  Earl  of  : 187. 

Chung-fu  (“Second  Father  ”)  : hono- 
rific title  of  Lii  Pu-wei,  327. 

Chung-ir ; see  Won,  Duke  or  Tsin. 

Chung-k’ang,  the  Emperor  ; 39,  330. 

Chung-kuo : see  Middle  Kingdom. 

Chung-ni,  literary  name  of  Confu- 
cius: 229. 

Chung-ting-i-k  'v-kuan-shi : 74. 

Chung-ting,  the  Emperor : 48,  330. 

Chung-tsun|,  the  Emperor ; see 
T’ai-mou. 

Chung-tu : Confucius  magistrate  of, 
244. 

Chung-yu : see  Tzi-lu. 

Chung-yung  (“The  Doctrine  of  the 
Mean  ”) : 26,  note  1,  255. 

Ch’ung,  Marquis  of : denounces 

Won-wang  for  lese-majesty,  59. 

Cinnabar:  121. 

Civil  Ofiice,  Board  of : formerly  had 
precedence  over  other  boards, 
111,  113. 

Classics,  the  Chinese  : Legge’s  edition 
of,  26,  note  1 ; their  connection 
with  Confucius,  251-255;  recog- 
nition of,  as  classical  books, 
305. 

Coal-sacks  : referred  to  in  old  legend, 

10. 

Compass  : see  Mariners’  Compass. 

Concubines,  imperial:  114. 


356 


INDEX 


Confucian  Classics : see  Classics, 

THE  Chinese. 

Confucianism  : main  cause  of  stabil- 
ity of  Chinese  nation,  242 ; re- 
strained by  Tartar  influences, 
268-273 ; by  rival  philosophers, 
280. 

Confucianists  : see  Confucius  ; Men- 
cius; Tsong  Ts’an. 

Confucian  Legends,  the  : 27—44. 

Confucius  : his  edition  of  the  Shu- 
king,  see  Shu-king;  not  posi- 
tive on  belief  in  future  life,  82 ; 
his  authorship  of  Ch’un-ts’iu, 
see  Ch’un-ts’iu;  his  greatness 
not  based  on  his  writings,  181 ; 
disapproves  of  Duke  Won  of 
Tsin’s  requiring  emperor  to 
attend  meeting  of  princes,  216 ; 
his  birth,  name,  and  genealogy, 
228-229 ; his  early  history,  229- 
231 ; exaggerates  burial  cere- 
monies, 230 ; interviews  Lau- 
tzi,  232,  240-241,  243;  his  view 
of  Tzi-ch’an,  232 ; his  philosophy 
a sort  of  indigenous  religion, 
237 ; is  silent  on  Lau-tzi,  238 ; 
the  “superior  man’’  chief  object 
of  his  teachings,  239,  254 ; com- 
pared with  Lau-tzi,  240-241 ; 
liis  life,  243-248 ; visits  imperial 
capital,  243 ; his  sojourn  in 
Ts’i  and  love  of  music,  243 ; in 
Lu  under  Duke  Ting,  244-246 ; 
in  Wei  under  Duke  Ling,  246- 
247 ; wanderings  from  state  to 
state,  247 ; from  Ch’u  returns 
to  Wei,  247-248 ; recalled  to 
Lu,  dies  in  479  b.c.,  248 ; his 
disciples,  248-250;  liis  influence 
on  Chinese  nation,  250 ; his 
works,  251-253 ; his  sayings, 
253-255 ; his  personality,  255- 
257 ; his  ethics  according  to 
Giles,  301 ; his  fame  greater 
during  Middle  Ages  than  under 
Ch6u  dynasty,  302. 

Contending  States,  the : 259-328 ; 
sources  of  history  of,  264-266. 

Contracts : how  legalized,  124. 

Cooking  : introduction  of,  6,  14. 

Copper ; see  Bronzes. 


Copper-mine : earliest,  alleged  to 
have  been  discovered  by  Huang-ti, 
23. 

Cordier,  Henri : his  Bibliotheca  Si- 
nica,  cited,  ix,  26,  note  1. 

Corea : supposed  to  have  formed 
part  of  Yii’s  empire,  38;  Wu- 
kong,  Ch6u-sin’s  son,  king  of, 
96,  104,  106,  183. 

Cosmogony : 3-7. 

Court  management : in  charge  of 
Mandarin  of  Heaven,  114. 

Criminal  law  : see  Autumn,  Manda- 
rin OP. 

“Criss-cross”  philosophers:  306, 

307-308. 

Culture : periods  of,  represented  by 
names  of  fabulous  and  legend- 
ary emperors,  6-7,  13-14 ; 

house,  palace,  and  temple  build- 
ing, towns,  and  provinces  under 
Huang-ti,  21 ; dyeing  materials 
under  Huang-ti,  23 ; matri- 
archy replaced  by  matrimony, 
60 ; words  represented  by  hiero- 
glyphics during  Shang  dynasty, 
75 ; hints  as  to  Shang  culture 
in  the  Shi-king,  76 ; the  Ch6u-li, 
a mine  of  information  on,  of 
the  Ch6u  period,  126 ; stone, 
jade,  bronze,  and  iron  ages, 
234-237 ; foreign  influences  in 
early  Chinese,  268-273 ; see  also, 
under  the  respective  headings. 
Agriculture,  Art,  Astron- 
omy, etc. 

Cyclical  characters : invention  of, 

referred  to  prehistoric  period, 
5 ; used  in  the  formation  of 
personal  names,  72  ; dates  desig- 
nated by,  173,  174;  see  also 
Calendar. 

Cypresses : 122. 

Daae,  I.  M. : on  the  landtax  in 
China,  298,  note  1. 

Deer,  white ; presented  as  tribute 
to  Mu-wang,  169. 

Deguignes,  J.  [father  and  son] : 
30. 

Deluge  under  Yau  and  Shim;  31; 
supposed  to  have  been  over- 


INDEX 


357 


come  by  the  engineering  works 
of  Yii,  33-38 ; apparent  exag- 
geration in  description  of,  35, 
55-56. 

Dialectics,  professors  of  ; 307-308. 

Diplomats ; according  to  Chdu-li, 
124-125 ; adherents  of  philo- 
sophical schools,  traveling  about, 
285 ; study  of  dialectics  by  in- 
tending, 307-308;  Su  Ts’in  and 
Chang  I,  the,  par  excellence, 
308-313 ; itinerant,  kept  out 
of  Ts’in  court  by  Wei  Jan, 
320. 

Disciples  of  Confucius  ; 248-250. 

Divination : must  not  be  repeated 
when  fortunate,  83 ; good  issue 
prayed  for  by  Ch6u-kung  before 
practising,  102,  103 ; means  of, 
during  the  Ch6u  dynasty,  118. 

Dogs : 121 ; see  also  Mastiff,  the 
Tibetan. 

Dragon  and  Phenix ; on  bronzes 
previous  to  Han  dynasty  have 
not  their  later  attributes,  88. 

Dragon  Boat  Regatta,  the : in  com- 
memoration of  K’ii  Yiian’s 
death,  315-316. 

Dragon,  the  Chinese : possibly  the 
naga  of  India,  88. 

Dreams  : influence  the  selection  of  a 
clever  minister,  53 ; interpreted 
by  scientists,  118 ; in  the  history 
of  Chau  state,  270 ; see  also 
Miracles. 

Dress  : skins  used  for,  before  Huang- 
ti,  23 ; invention  of  weaving 
ascribed  to  Huang-ti’s  wife,  23; 
skin  and  felt  coats  worn  by  the 
Huns,  168 ; Tartar  dress  worn 
and  boots  introduced  by  King 
Wu-ling  of  Chau,  272  and  note 
1 ; see  also  Uniforms. 

Drums : see  Music  and  Bronze 

DRUMS. 

Earth,  the  Mandarin  of  (ti-kuan)  : 
113,  115-117 ; levied  soldiers, 
119. 

Eastern  Ch6u  : see  Tung-chou. 

Eclipses ; see  Astronomy. 

Edkins,  J. : 131,  135-136. 


Egotism,  Yang  Chu’s  philosophy  of : 
see  Yang  Chu. 

Egret,  the  : an  old  emblem  of  Chinese 
skin  drums  and  of  bronze  drums, 
196. 

Egyptian  scroll : see  Thunder  pat- 
tern. 

Eitel,  E.  J. : on  the  Shu-king  eclipse, 
40-41 ; on  Sv-wang-mu,  149,  150. 

Elephants : occurred  in  Hu-nan  up 
to  seventh  century  a.d.,  121 ; 
tusk  brought  from  Timgking, 
127;  see  also  Ivory. 

Emperors  : the  Three  and  the  Nine, 
5;  the  Five  Rulers,  12. 

Emperor,  the,  or  “Son  of  Heaven”: 
responsible  for  natural  phe- 
nomena, 36;  high  priest  of  the 
nation,  reigns  in  the  name  of 
God,  79 ; represents  nation  in 
sacrificing  and  praying  to  God, 
certain  minor  deities  and  his 
ancestors,  80-83,  177,  220 ; his 
title  t’iln-tzx,  see  “Son  of 
Heaven”;  the  title  ti  (“em- 
peror”) discarded  and  replaced 
by  wang  (“king”),  96-97;  re- 
sumed by  Shi-huang-ti,  97 ; 
during  the  Ch6u  dynasty  held 
position  similar  to  German  Em- 
peror, 108 ; his  functions,  109 ; 
is  the  patriarch  of  the  nation, 
his  chief  assistant  is  the  “Man- 
darin of  Heaven,”  111;  re- 
garded as  the  ruler  of  the 
world,  112;  his  palace  during 
the  Ch6u  dynasty,  114-115; 
personal  life  of,  regulated  by 
strict  ceremonial,  115;  his  right 
of  pardon  in  criminal  cases,  123 ; 
traveled  about  for  his  informa- 
tion, 124-125 ; staff  of  officers 
reporting  to,  on  occurrences  in 
his  dominions,  124 ; on  topo- 
graphical, historical,  social, 
and  economical  questions,  125 ; 
warned  by  Heaven  on  accoimt 
of  bad  government,  143,  172- 
174 ; condescension  and  affa- 
bility of,  weaken  his  position, 
154 ; terrorism  creates  spirit  of 
independence  among  vassals. 


358 


INDEX 


154 ; Siian-wang’s  failure  to  per- 
form field  labor  as  a ceremo- 
nial act  ends  in  disaster,  158 ; 
his  dominion  small  as  com- 
pared with  federal  states,  188, 
197 ; his  power  nominal  in  the 
Ch’un-ts’iu  period,  197 ; loyally 
supported  by  Duke  Huan  of 
Ts’i,  his  most  powerful  vassal, 
207 ; his  authority  to  change 
boundaries  of  federal  states, 
207-208;  great  officers  not  put 
to  death  and  promotions  not 
made  without  his  sanction,  210; 
required  to  attend  meeting  pre- 
sided over  by  Duke  Won  of 
Tsin,  216 ; his  nominal  power 
upheld  solely  by  spirit  of 
loyalty  among  feudal  states, 
217-218;  obliged  to  flee  from 
his  capital,  219;  has  to  raise 
loan  to  defray  predecessor’s 
burial  expenses,  220 ; slighted 
by  vassal  of  Ch’u,  220-221; 
his  summons  disobeyed  by 
vassal  princes,  275 ; a mere 
shadow  at  the  time  of  Mencius, 
284-285 ; Mencius  on  the  po- 
sition of,  294 ; Ts’in  and  Ts’i 
plan  the  adoption  of  title,  318; 
his  dominion  annexed  by  Ts’in ; 
fall  of  the  Ch6u  dynasty,  325, 
327-328 ; see  also  Interreg- 
num ; Kung-ho  period  ; Meet- 
ing OP  PRINCES. 

Epicure  compared  to  Yang  Chu : 
278. 

Eimuchs,  court : 114. 

Exchange,  means  of  : precious  stones, 
gold,  and  copper,  22 ; skins, 
silks,  dogs,  horses,  pearls,  gems, 
68 ; cowries,  75. 

Fa,  Duke  and  King  of  Ch6u : see 

WU-WANQ. 

Faber,  E. : on  Mo  Ti  (Micius),  282, 
note  1 ; on  Mencius,  292,  293. 

Fame,  according  to  Yang  Chu  : 278. 

Fan  Tsii,  chancellor  in  Ts’in  ; 320- 
323 ; his  policy  counteracted  by 
“The  Four  Nobles,”  321-322; 
his  hostility  against  Po  K’i, 


322 ; asks  to  be  punished  and  is 
rewarded,  323. 

Fang-hiin : private  name  of  Yau, 
29. 

Fatalism,  Yang  Chu’s:  279. 

Fei-tzi,  the  first  prince  of  Ts’in  ; 153, 
332,  333. 

Fief-holders : appointed  to  reward 
merit  of  distinguished  ancestors, 
99. 

Fief  names  : see  Yu  (“to  have  ”)  and 
the  several  names  following. 

Filial  piety : want  of,  according  to 
Confucius,  parent’s  fault,  245; 
Tzi-lu  known  for,  Tsong  Ts’an 
model  of,  249 ; key-note  of 
Confucius’  views  on  govern- 
ment, 254;  basis  of  Mencius’ 
philosophy,  288 ; Canon  of,  see 
Hiau-king. 

Fire : discovery  of  method  of  pro- 
ducing, 6. 

Fire  Producer  : see  Sui-jon. 

“Firewood,  to  sleep  on,”  the  phrase  : 
261  and  note  1. 

Fisherman,  story  of  the  old  : 304. 

Fishing : introduction  of,  ascribed 
to  Fu-hi,  9,  14 ; sportsmanlike 
treatment  of,  advocated  by 
Ch’ong-t’ang,  47 ; Ts’ing-ch6u 
(Shan-tung)  and  Yu-ch6u  (Chi-li) 
noted  for  their,  121,  122. 

“Five  Canons,”  the  : see  Wu-king. 

Five  Dragons  (period) : 5,  329. 

Five  Happinesses,  the : see  Happi- 
nesses, THE  Five. 

Five  Leaders,  the  : century  of,  199- 
223  ; names  of,  206 ; according 
to  Mencius  offended  in  loyalty 
against  the  old  emperors,  293- 
295. 

Five  relations,  the,  of  man  to  man : 
254. 

Five  Rulers,  the  (Fu-hi,  Shon-nung, 
Huang-ti,  Yau,  and  Shun)  : 12. 

Flags  and  standards  introduced  by 
Huang-ti : 22 ; red  the  color  of 
imperial,  under  Wu-wang,  99; 
adorned  with  blazonry  of  birds, 
160;  used  in  war  according  to 
Shi-king,  164 ; their  emblems 
described,  165. 


INDEX 


359 


Flocks,  keeping  of ; said  to  have 
been  commenced  by  Fu-hi,  9, 
14. 

Fong  [-ch’ong] : old  capital  of  the 
dukes  of  Ch6u,  south  of  the  Wei 
River,  99,  169. 

Fong-hu-tzi,  expert  on  swords  : 235. 

Fong,  Prince  of  K’ang,  Wu-wang’s 
brother : invested  with  Wei, 

346. 

Foreign  affairs : no  special  Board 

of,  before  1901  a.d..  Ill  and 
note  1 ; in  charge  of  subordi- 
nate of  Mandarin  of  Autiunn, 
124. 

Foreigners : superior  civilization  of, 
compared  by  Chinese  to  their 
own,  19. 

Foreign  influences  before  the  time 
of  Wu-ti : 268-273. 

Foreign  nations  regarded  as  mere 
boundary  tribes  : 112. 

Forke,  A. ; on  Mu-wang  and  the 
Si-wang-mu  legend,  150-151 ; 
on  Yang  Chu,  277,  note  1. 

“ Four  Books,  ” the  : see  Ssi-sHU. 

Four  Nobles,  the : 321-326,  328. 

Fowls:  121. 

Fr^ret,  N. : on  the  Shu-king  eclipse, 
41. 

Frogs  : an  emblem  on  ancient  bronze 
drums,  possibly  a totem  of  Man 
barbarians,  196. 

Frontier  posts : relieved  annually, 
supplied  from  peasantry,  163. 

Fu-ch’ai,  King  of  Wu:  234,  348; 
commits  suicide,  262. 

Fu-hi : alleged  first  historical  em- 
peror, 7,  329 ; appearance  and 
pictorial  representations  of,  7,  8 ; 
organizes  society,  9 ; intro- 
duced hunting,  fishing,  cattle 
flocks,  music,  the  pa-kua  sym- 
bols, hieroglyphics,  etc.,  9; 
divides  all  things  into  male  and 
female,  59-61 ; replaces  matri- 
archy by  matrimony,  60. 

Fu-nan : 127. 

Future  life ; see  Ancestors  ; 
Heaven ; Life  after  death ; 
Spirits  of  the  departed. 

Fu-yii6  : minister  under  Wu-ting,  53. 


Gabelentz,  G.  von  der  : on  Kuan-tzi, 
202 ; on  Confucius,  242 ; on  Mo 
Ti  (Mek  Tik),  282,  note  1. 

Gardeners  hold  second  rank  in  popu- 
lation : 110. 

Gardner,  C.  T. : on  the  Tablet  of  Yii, 
90. 

Gaubil,  A. : 30,  41. 

Gem,  the  sacred  {pi)  : 102. 

Genealogy  : of  early  emperors,  25 ; 
pedigrees  of  Yii,  Shun,  Clii,  Yau, 
Ch’oiig-t’ang,  and  the  Ch6u 
emperors  derived  from  Ti-k’u, 
25-26 ; Yii  a descendant  of 
Huang- ti,  33;  Confucius’,  228; 
see  also  Chronological  Tables. 

Generals  in  command : how  styled, 
165. 

Geographical  position  of  states  closely 
connected  with  their  develop- 
ment : 182,  188. 

Geography  : of  the  Empire  accord- 
ing to  the  Ch6u-li,  119-123; 
resembles  that  of  the  Yu-kung, 
123,  182;  legendary  terms  in 
Chinese,  connected  with  western 
boundary,  147 ; of  the  Ch’un- 
ts’iu  period,  181-197. 

Geomancers  (fang-kia)  : 132. 

Germany : China  during  the  Ch6u 
dynasty  resembles,  108,  181. 

Giles,  H.  A. : his  chronology  of  Fu-hi, 
7,  note  2;  on  Si-wang-mu,  151, 
note  2;  on  Kuan-tzi ’s  work, 
202 ; on  the  Tau-to-king,  238 ; 
on  the  T ’ung-kiin-kang-mu,  264— 
265 ; on  Li6-tzi,  276 ; on  Lau-tzi 
and  Chuang-tzi,  300-301. 

Gnomon : see  Astronomy. 

God  (Shang-ti)  : prayers  to,  referred 
to  in  accounts  of  oldest  emper- 
ors, 100,  253 ; never  disavowed 
by  the  ancient  Chinese,  101  ; 
Ch6u-kung’s  views  on,  102-103 ; 
see  also  Heaven;  Sacrifice  to 
God. 

Goethe : interested  in  Chinese  stud- 
ies, V,  vii. 

Government : strictness  and  liber- 
ality of  Huang-ti’s,  22 ; divided 
into  eight  branches  by  Shun,  31 ; 
share  of  responsibility  in,  by 


360 


INDEX 


ministers  and  advisers,  33 ; the 
sovereign  responsible  for  natural 
catastrophes,  36,  79-80,  105, 
172-174;  reorganized  imder  Wu- 
wang,  98-99 ; democratic  sys- 
tem in  promotion  of  officers  of, 
99 ; foundation  of  government 
due  to  Ch6u-kung,  107 ; immu- 
tabihty  of,  based  on  that  of 
individuals  in  public  and  pri- 
vate hfe,  109 ; patriarchal  char- 
acter of,  110;  six  divisions  of, 
prototype  of  modern  “Six 
Boards,”  111,  112-113;  inter- 
ference with  private  life,  115- 
1 17 ; officers  of,  selected  from 
among  the  people,  99,  117;  not 
punished  in  public,  123-124, 
322 ; “ the  five  articles  ” fixing 
principles  of,  210;  Confucius’ 
views  of,  based  on  filial  piety, 
254 ; see  also  Ch6u-li  ; Con- 
fucius ; Kuan-tzi  ; Mencius. 

Great  Khan  : see  Shan-yu. 

Greek  pattern : see  Thunder  pat- 
tern. 

Groot,  J.  J.  M.  de : 196,  note  2. 

Grosier,  Abb6  : 265. 

Ground  taxes : 296-298 ; see  also 
Taxes. 

Grube,  W. : on  the  preponderance 
of  speeches  in  oldest  historical 
texts,  156 ; considers  both  Ch’un- 
ts’iu  and  Tso-chuan  works  of 
Confucius,  181 ; on  Kuan-tzi, 
202,  205 ; on  Yang  Chu,  279. 

Gumpach,  J.  von : on  the  Shu-king 
eclipse,  41. 

Haenisch,  E. : on  the  Tablet  of  Yii, 
90,  note  1. 

Han,  the  state  of : beginnings,  263 ; 
recognized  as  a feudal  state, 
264;  one  of  the  “Seven  Heroes” 
states,  266 ; conquers  Chong, 
274 ; joins  confederation  against 
Ts’in,  310;  kingdom  since  332 
B.C.,  315;  loses  territory  agaimst 
Ts’in,  316;  defeated  by  Ts’in  in 
battle  of  I-k’ii6,  318 ; defeated 
by  Ts’in,  325 ; does  homage  to 
Ts’in,  neglecting  the  emperor, 


and  is  annexed  by  Ts’in,  326, 
328,  336;  princes  of,  335-336. 

Han-cho,  usurper : 42,  330. 

Han-fei,  the  philosopher  : mentions 
“south-pointers,”  128;  pupil  of 
Siin  K’uang,  the  anti-Confu- 
cianist,  326. 

Han-fei-tzi  (the  book)  : 128,  note  2 ; 
see  also  Han-fei,  the  philos- 
opher. 

Han-ku  Pass : Lau-tzi  there  takes 
leave  of  China,  307,  313;  Ts’in ’s 
victory  at  the,  313. 

Han  River : 143. 

Han-tan  : capital  of  Chau,  322-324 ; 
the  “Lady  of  Han-tan,”  mother 
of  Shi-huang-ti,  324,  328. 

Han  Yii,  author ; defends  Confu- 
cianism, 302. 

Hangchow  : 132. 

Happinesses,  the  Five  : 82. 

Harakiri : traces  of,  in  China,  322, 
note  1. 

Hatchets ; see  Weapons. 

Hau  : city  built  by  Wu-wang  near 
the  present  Si-an-fu,  54,  99,  169. 

Heaven  and  Earth : as  objects  of 
worship,  79. 

Heavenly  emperors  ; 5,  329. 

Heaven,  Mandarin  of  {t’i&n-kvari)  : 
111,  112-115. 

Heaven : the  term  t’iin  for,  may 
mean  the  “other  world”  and 
Allah,  or  God,  96 ; ancestors  in, 
have  charge  of  descendants,  103  ; 
gives  warnings  on  account  of 
bad  government,  143,  172-174; 
see  also  Ancestors  ; God. 

Heger,  Franz  : 196,  note  2. 

Hei-ki6n,  Duke  of  Ch6u  : 201. 

Hell  and  purgatory  : none  referred  to 
in  the  Chinese  Classics,  82. 

Helmets  : worn  by  princes  and  war- 
riors, 164. 

Hemp:  121. 

Hereditary  monopolies : 117. 

D’Hervey  de  Saint-Denys : 194, 

notes  1 and  2. 

Hi  and  Ho,  the  astronomers  : fail  to 
predict  an  eclipse  under  Yau, 
30 ; under  Chung-k’ang,  39-41. 

Hi-wang,  the  Emperor  : 218,  332. 


INDEX 


361 


Hia  dynasty,  the ; 32-44,  330. 

Hia  Kui  (Japanese  Kakei),  artist : 89. 

Hia-po,  title  of  the  Emperor  Yii : 32. 

Hiau,  Duke  of  Ts’i : 218-219,  340. 

Hiau-king  (“Canon  of  Fihal  Piety”)  : 
249. 

Hiau-wang,  the  Emperor ; 153,  332. 

Hiau-won,  King  of  Ts’in ; 334 ; 

father  of  Prince  I-jon,  declared 
heir  apparent  by  Lii  Pu-wei’s 
intrigue,  323-324;  reigned  but 
one  year,  327  ; premature  death 
of,  possibly  due  to  Lii  Pu-wei, 
328. 

Hides : see  Skins. 

Hi6n,  Duke  of  Tsin  : 212,  334. 

Hi4n-wang,  the  Emperor  : 275,  332. 

Hi6n-yang : capital  of  Ts’in,  the 

present  Si-an-fu,  317. 

Hi4n-yiian  ; personal  name  of  Huang- 
ti,  12 ; of  a primeval  emperor 
previous  to  Fu-hi,  236. 

Hi4n-yiin : see  Huns. 

Hieroglyphics  : of  299  b.c.  deciphered 
by  connoisseurs  in  280  a.d.,  50; 
on  bronze  vessels  of  the  Shang 
dynasty,  71-76 ; Chinese  works 
containing  facsimile  reproduc- 
tions of,  73-74 ; words  repre- 
sented by,  of  the  Shang  d3masty, 
75-76;  the,  for  “thunder”  used 
for  ornamental  purposes ; sym- 
bolic meaning,  89 ; hieroglyphics 
attributed  to  the  Emperor  Yu 
probably  forgeries,  90 ; on  the 
“Stone  Drums  of  the  Ch6u  Dy- 
nasty,” 170-171;  see  aZso  Chal- 
FANT,  F.  H. 

Hill  Jung  : see  Shan-jung. 

Historians : not  critical  as  to  be- 
ginning of  historical  period,  3; 
board  of,  ascribed  to  Huang-ti, 
20,  156;  Ts’ang-ki4,  the  first 
state  historian,  20;  some,  ex- 
clude period  of  mourning  from 
sovereigns’  reign,  31 ; ascribe 
great  decisions  to  ministers  and 
advisers,  33,  34;  extol  virtues 
of  founders  and  blacken  char- 
acter of  last  rulers  of  d3masties, 
43,  53 ; responsible  for  legendary 
character  of  periods  down  to 


Ch6u-sin,  55-56,  125 ; keep 

emperor  posted  on  local  his- 
tories ; division  of  work  among, 
during  the  Ch6u  dynasty,  125 ; 
ought  to  enjoy  liberty  of  speech, 
155 ; method  adopted  in  con- 
structing most  ancient  history, 
156 ; partiality  of  Confucianist, 
268. 

Historical  period : beginning  of, 

variously  dated,  175. 

History,  the  ancient,  of  China ; best 
basis  for  knowledge  of  nation, 
vii-viii. 

Hiung  : clan  name  of  the  sovereigns 
of  Ch’u,  190,  336. 

Hiung  I : ancestor  of  the  kings  of 
Ch’u,  invested  with  this  terri- 
tory, 190,  192,  336. 

Hiung-ir  (Ho-nan)  : supposed  home 
of  primeval  emperors,  5. 

Hiung  K’ii  of  Ch’u : usurps  the  title 
“King,”  190,  337. 

Hiung-nu ; see  Huns. 

Hiung  T’ung  of  Ch’u:  confirmed  as 
King  Wu,  190,  337. 

Ho  : a sacred  mountain,  122. 

Ho-lu,  King  of  Wu : 233-234,  348. 

Ho-sii,  primeval  emperor : 236. 

Ho-tan-kia,  the  Emperor:  49,  331. 

Hong  : a sacred  mountain,  121,  122. 

Horn  : bows  made  of,  164. 

Horses : in  hieroglyphics  of  Shang 
dynasty,  75 ; with  oxen,  chief 
produce  of  Yung-ch6u  (the 
Ordos  territory),  and  Ki-ch6u 
(South  Shan-si),  122 ; a dealer 
in,  elevated  to  rank  of  Prince  of 
Ts’in,  153 ; four  steeds  har- 
nessed to  war  chariots  in  cam- 
paign against  the  Huns,  159 ; 
long,  stout,  and  large-headed, 
160;  how  yoked,  harnessed,  and 
adorned  before  war  chariots, 
163-164;  guided  by  foot-sol- 
diers in  war,  164;  with  oxen 
and  sheep,  reared  by  the  Huns, 
168;  cavalry,  introduced  by 
King  Wu-ling  of  Chau,  272- 
273 ; riding,  not  usual  before 
third  century  B.c.,  273. 

Hou  (=  marquis) : 98. 


362 


INDEX 


Hdu-han-shu : 19. 

H6u-i  minister  and  general-in- 
chief,  39-42. 

H6u-tsi : posthumous  son  of  the 

Emperor  Ti-k’u,  26. 

House-building  : first  introduced  by 
Huang-ti,  21. 

Hii  Hing,  “the  agriculturist”:  re- 
futed by  Mencius,  290. 

Hu,  a descendant  of  the  Emperor 
Shun  ; invested  with  Ch’on,  343. 

Hu  An-kuo,  historian : on  Lii  Pu- 
wei,  328. 

Hu-naiv-fang-wu-chi:  121. 

Hu-pei  province : supposed  home 

of  Shon-nung,  11. 

Hua:  a sacred  mountain,  121. 

Hua-sii : mother  of  the  Emperor 
Fu-hi,  8. 

Hua  Tu  : minister  in  Sung,  229. 

Hua-yang  : principal  wife  of  Hiau- 
won,  the  King,  as  Prince  of  Ts’in, 
323. 

Huai,  King  of  Ch’u : 315,  317,  337. 

Huai-nan-tzi : see  Liu  An. 

Huan,  Duke  of  Ts’i : first  of  the 
“Five  Leaders,”  201,  206,  207- 
211,  217,  218,  339;  given  to 
evil  courses  in  old  age,  211 ; his 
end,  211,  218-219;  his  treat- 
ment of  Duke  Won  of  Tsin,  214 ; 
favors  legitimate  succession  to 
imperial  throne,  209,  218. 

Huan-wang,  the  Emperor  : 197,  332. 

Huang-fu  (=  Nan-chung),  general : 
161. 

Huang-fu : special  term  for  the 

“Steppe  Dependency,”  169. 

Huang  Hi6  : see  Chun-sh6n-kun. 

Huang-ho  : see  Yellow  River. 

Huang-ti : first  emperor  according 
to  Ssi-ma  Ts’idn,  7,  329 ; his 
person  and  government,  12 ; 
makes  war  on  the  Huns,  13 ; 
inventions  ascribed  to,  13,  20- 
23 ; alleged  connection  with 
Babylonia,  14-18 ; further  deeds 
of,  20-23 ; his  death,  24 ; de- 
scendants of,  appointed  fief- 
holders  under  Wu-wang,  99; 
said  by  some  to  have  invented 
south-pointing  chariots,  129 ; 


represents  the  prehistoric 
neolithic  period,  236. 

Huber,  Ed.,  on  Si-wang-mu : 151, 
note  2. 

Hui,  Duke  of  Tsin  : 213,  215,  334. 

Hui,  King  of  Liang,  i.e.  Wei : 335 ; 
Mencius’  conversations  with, 
287,  289. 

Hui-tsung,  the  Emperor : a patron 
of  art,  71,  73,  131. 

Hui-wang,  the  Emperor ; 218,  332. 

Hui-won,  King  of  Ts’in  : 316,  333. 

Human  emperors  : 5,  329. 

Humboldt,  Von,  on  Si-wang-mu : 
151,  note  2. 

“Hundsfott”  (German)  : wrongly 

derived  from  “Hunnus  fuit,”  68. 

Huns  : known  in  Cliina  as  Hun-yii, 
Hiin-yu,  Hi6n-yiin,  K’iian,  and 
Hiung-nu,  names  connected 
with  the  root  Hun  or  Kun,  13, 
67-69,  159,  168 ; driven  away 
by  Huang-ti,  13;  as  Wu-wang ’s 
allies  help  to  overturn  the  Shang 
djuasty,  64-65,  70,  169 ; con- 
clude treaty  with  China  in  47 
B.c. ; words  from  their  language 
preserved  in  Chinese  hterature 
prove  to  be  Turkish,  66 ; levy 
tribute  from  T’ai-wang  and  Won- 
wang  and  attack  T’ai-wang ’s 
state,  68-69,  169 ; defeated  by 
Won-wang  (1138  b.c.),  70;  en- 
croached on  Chinese  territory 
during  Ch6u  dynasty,  120; 
campaign  against,  described  in 
the  Sht-king,  159-161 ; at  one 
time  held  territory  as  far  as  the 
River  King  and  T’ai-yiian,  160, 
161 ; Chinese  soldiers  afraid  of, 
163 ; expeditions  against,  in 
what  season  imdertaken,  164 ; 
more  successful  on  large  plains 
than  on  hilly  territory,  166 ; 
advantages  on  the  Chinese  side 
in  war  against,  166-167  ; Ssi-ma 
Ts’i6n’s  account  of,  167-170; 
Shan-jimg,  Hi4n-yiin,  and  Hun- 
yii  divisions  of,  before  the  time 
of  Y au  and  Shun ; honor  robust, 
and  neglect  old  and  weak  men, 
168;  attack  and  kill  Yu-wang, 


INDEX 


363 


169,  177 ; the  states  of  Tsin 
and  Ts’in  fight  against  Huns  to 
protect  China,  183 ; a pohtical, 
not  a racial  union,  183-184; 
Huns  of  Europe  and  Hiung-nu 
identical  and  of  Turkish  extrac- 
tion; the  Turk  and  Sir-Tardush 
nations  and  the  Uigurs  off- 
shoots of  the  Hiung-nu,  184, 
note  1 ; possibly  related  to 
Scythians,  185 ; their  line  of 
kings  compared  with  Chinese 
records,  185-187 ; Northern 
Jimg  send  foot-soldiers  to  fight 
the  Chinese,  187-188 ; early 
contests  between,  and  Man  bar- 
barians according  to  old  legend, 
194 ; depend  on  the  coast  of 
Ts’i  for  salt,  204 ; after  war  with 
Tsin  and  Ts’in  cease  to  make 
inroads,  263 ; use  skull  of  enemy 
for  ritual  purposes  like  the 
Boians,  270-272 ; see  also  I-k’u- 
5ung;  Jung  and  Ti;  K’uan- 

JUNG. 

Hun-yii  and  Hiin-yu  ; see  Huns. 

Hunting ; introduction  of,  ascribed 
to  Fu-hi,  9,  14;  hunting  parties 
cause  of  pohtical  troubles,  39, 
42,  143 ; sportsmanlike  treat- 
ment of,  by  Ch’ong-t’ang,  47 ; 
Ch6u-sin’s  hunting  parties,  53, 
54;  soldiers  enlisted  for,  119; 
Chau-wang’s  passion  for,  143 ; 
Mu-wang’s  hunting  expeditions, 
144;  hunting  the  Image  of  war, 
162 ; birds,  rats,  foxes,  and 
hares  shot  by  children ; hunting 
and  cattle-breeding  means  of 
livelihood  among  Huns,  168 ; 
Siian-wang’s  hunting  expedi- 
tions described  on  Stone  Drums, 

170. 

I : a sacred  mountain,  121. 

I (barbarians  of  the  east)  ; referred 
to  in  Tso-chuan,  185. 

I Chi ; minister  during  the  Shang 
dynasty,  48. 

I-hing,  the  astronomer : aware  of 
the  deviation  of  magnetic  needle, 
131,  135. 


I-hu  (=  Kimg-wang) : 152. 

I-jon,  Prince  of  Ts’in : see  Chuang- 

SIANG. 

I-king,  or  “ Book  of  Changes  ” : one 
of  the  oldest  products  of  Chinese 
hterature,  59,  192;  based  on 
Fu-hi ’s  mystie  trigraphs  (see 
Pa-kua)  ; ascribed  to  Won- 
wang,  59-62 ; recommended  by 
Confucius,  62 ; extended  by 
Ch6u-kung,  104;  Confucius’  re- 
lation to,  251. 

I-kiu  : personal  name  of  P’ing-wang, 
177. 

I-k’ii-jung  (Huns)  : withstand  Tsin 
and  Ts’in,  263. 

I-k’ii6  : city  in  the  present  Ho-nan 
province,  celebrated  battle-field, 
318. 

I-hng : the  mausolea  of  the  kings  of 
Ch’u,  319. 

I^-wang,  the  Emperor  : 154,  332. 

I^-wang,  the  Emperor  ; 153,  332. 

I-wu-lii  : a sacred  mountain,  122. 

I Yin:  minister  under  Ch’ong-t’ang 
and  his  successors,  47 ; consoli- 
dates the  power  of  the  Shang 
dynasty,  47-48. 

Indian  population  in  Eastern  Turke- 
stan : 19. 

Industries  described  in  the  Chdu-li; 
126. 

Inscriptions,  hierogl3T3hic : on  the 
bronze  vessels  of  the  Shang 
dynasty,  71-76;  on  stone  and 
jade  attributed  to  the  Emperor 
Yii,  90 ; on  the  bronze  tripod  of 
Silver  Island,  161 ; on  the  Stone 
Drums,  170-171 ; see  also  Hiero- 
glyphics. 

Intercalary  month  : introduction  of, 
ascribed  to  Huang-ti,  22. 

Interpreters,  court : 125 ; accom- 

pany ambassadors  from  Tung- 
king,  127. 

Interregnum : when  there  was  no 
emperor  in  China,  327 ; see  also 
Kung-ho  period,  the. 

Inundation:  see  Deluge;  Yellow 
River. 

Irrigation  of  soil : under  advice  of 
government  officers,  110. 


364 


INDEX 


Iron  age,  the,  in  China  : 236. 

Iron : consumption  and  taxation  of, 
in  Ts’i;  Chinese,  best  on  Roman 
market,  204 ; implements  of, 
in  seventh  century  b.c.,  204 ; 
arms  of,  about  500  b.c., 
235. 

Ivory  : formerly  produced  in  Hu-nan, 
121 ; and  in  the  kingdom  of 
Ch’u,  214;  brought  from  Tung- 
king,  127  ; bows  had  ornaments 
of,  164. 

Jade  age  in  China  corresponding  to 
neolithic  period ; 236. 

Jade : said  to  have  been  known  to 
Huang-ti,  13  ; works  of  art  made 
of,  89-91 ; the  word  yii  for, 
occurs  in  the  oldest  texts,  91 ; 
as  coming  from  Khotan  prob- 
ably sparingly  used  before  sec- 
ond century  b.c.,  91 ; article  of 
trade  in  Yung-oh6u  south  of 
Ordos  territory,  122. 

Jon-hau  (or  Mu),  Duke  of  Ts’in  : 333. 

Jon-huang:  see  Human  emperors. 

Jon-tsung,  the  Emperor : 131,  136. 

Jo-shui  (“Weak  Water”)  : 147,  148. 

Julien,  Stanislas : translates  his- 

torical drama,  269,  note  1. 

Jung  (Huns)  : attack  T’an-fu,  168; 
driven  away  by  Wu-wang  and 
called  Huang-fu  as  a tributary 
state,  169 ; referred  to  in  Tso- 
chuan,  185,  187,  188 ; emperor’s 
war  against,  supported  by  Tsin, 
219 ; Tsin  and  Ts’in  unite 
against,  263. 

Juries:  see  People’s  voice. 

Justice,  Board  of : 113,  123-125. 

Justice  of  the  peace.  Mandarin  of 
Earth  acts  as:  116. 

K’ai-fong-fu  (Ho-nan)  : various  art 
collections  at,  73. 

Kan-p’an : adviser  imder  Wu-ting, 
53. 

Kan-su  and  Shen-si : the  cradle  of 
Chinese  civilization,  4. 

K’ang-hi,  the  Emperor : has  the 

T’ung-kiin-kang-mu  translated 
into  Manchu,  265. 


K’ang-wang,  the  Emperor  : 138,  331 ; 
after  him  the  house  of  Ch6u  fell 
into  decay,  159,  178. 

Karashar : 149. 

Kau-li4,  King  of  Ch’u:  321,  337. 

Kau-yang : private  name  of  the 

Emperor  Chuan-hii,  25. 

K ’au-ku-t  ’u:  72-73 . 

K ’avr-kung-ki : 125. 

K’au-wang,  the  Emperor:  263,  332. 

Khan,  or  Great  Khan  : see  Shan-tu. 

Khotan  : oldest  inhabitants  of,  18-19, 
151 ; jade  quarries  of,  91. 

Ki  ( = Mu-y4)  in  North  Ho-nan  : old 
manuscripts  discovered  at,  50. 

Ki-ch6u  province : 122. 

Ki-fu  : see  Yin  Ki-eu. 

Ki-li,  or  Ki,  Duke  of  Ch6u : 58,  103, 
331. 

K’i-fu,  or  Shang-fu : ancient  term 
for  general,  165. 

K’i,  Mount : selected  as  residence  by 
T’ai-wang,  69,  169 ; ancestral 
home  of  the  Chou  emperors, 
170. 

K’i,  the  Emperor : see  Ti-k’i. 

Kiang,  Lady,  wife  of  Duke  Won  of 
Tsin:  214,  215. 

Kiang  : see  Y ang-tzi  River. 

Kiang-yiian,  the  Empress  : 25. 

K’iang  tribes  : see  Tangutans. 

Ki6-kui : see  Kie. 

Ki4 : the  last  emperor  of  the  Hia 
dynasty,  43-44,  330 ; deposed, 
47 ; his  history  a parallel  to 
that  of  Chou-sin,  53 ; loses 
the  Nine  Tripods,  222;  Yang 
Chu  thinks  his  a happy  life, 
278. 

Ki4n,  Duke  of  Ts’i : 340 ; deprived 
of  throne  and  murdered,  273. 

Ki4n-wang,  the  Emperor : 227,  332. 

K’i4n-lung,  the  Emperor:  his  collec- 
tions, 71 ; publishes  an  illus- 
trated catalogue  of  bronzes, 
73. 

Kin-shi-so : 73. 

“King”  wang)  : when  the  title 
was  enforced  by  federal  states, 
314-315. 

King-ch6u  province:  121,  189;  see 
also  Ch’u,  the  state  of. 


INDEX 


365 


King,  Duke  of  Ts’i : 243-244,  340. 

King-lu  2LTxd.  king-luk  — kingrak  (“a 
sabre”)  : oldest  Turkish  word 
on  record,  66-67,  169. 

King-kiau,  the  early  Christian  re- 
ligion ; 238. 

King,  River : Huns  penetrate  to 
south  of,  160,  161. 

King^-wang,  the  Emperor : 232,  332. 

King^-wang,  the  Emperor  : 233,  332. 

K’ing-wang,  the  Emperor  : 219-220, 
332. 

Kingsmill,  T.  W. : 147. 

Kiu-ting : see  Nine  Tripods,  the. 

K’iu,  personal  name  of  Confucius: 
229. 

Knives  : alloys  of  bronze,  126 ; made 
of  iron  in  seventh  century  b.c., 
204. 

Knot-writing  : 7,  9. 

Ko-chi-king-yilan : 131. 

K6u-tsi6n,  King  of  Yii6 : 234-235, 
261-262,  348. 

Kii,  the  state  of : 188. 

K’ii-f6u  (Shan-tung)  : supposed  resi- 
dence of  Shdn-mmg,  11 ; burial 
place  of  Shau-hau,  24 ; the  earl- 
dom of,  given  to  Ch6u-kung, 
99-100;  home  of  the  K’ung 
(Confucius)  family,  228. 

K’ii-wu,  in  South  Shan-si : seat  of  a 
family  usurping  the  throne  of 
Tsin,  334. 

K’ii  Yiian,  the  poet : 315-316,  317. 

Kiln-tzi:  see  Superior  Man,  the. 

Kublai  Khan : causes  the  T’ung- 
ki(n-kang-mu  to  be  translated 
into  Uigur,  264-265. 

Ku-kin-chu:  129. 

Ku-kung  : see  T’an-fu. 

Ku-liang  Clii : Ids  commentary  on 
the  Ch’un-ts’iu,  180. 

Ku-yii-t’xi-p’u : 89,  90. 

K’u,  the  Emperor : see  Ti-k’u. 

K’iian-jung  (Huns):  68;  Mu-wang’s 
campaign  against  the,  144,  152, 
169 ; bring  about  the  ruin  of 
Yu-wang  and  his  paramour 
Pau  Ssi,  169,  172-177;  they 
settle  between  the  rivers  King 
and  Wei,  169-170;  legend  of 
one  of  their  chiefs  being  killed 


by  P’an-hu,  the  ancestor  of 
the  Man  barbarians,  194. 

Kua : see  Pa-kua. 

Kuan  Chung  : see  Kuan-tzi. 

Kuan  I-wu  : see  Kuan-tzi. 

Kuan-tzi,  the  philosopher : an  early 
statistician,  119,  123,  203;  as 
minister  of  Ts’i  helps  Duke 
Huan  to  leadership,  201,  207, 
217 ; opiidons  divided  as  to 
his  work  on  government  meth- 
ods, 202,  205 ; his  adminis- 
tration in  Ts’i  a model  to  later 
generations,  exemplified  by  his 
views  on  the  taxation  of  salt 
and  iron,  203-205 ; his  expedi- 
tion against  the  Shan-jung,  207 ; 
his  pohcy  against  the  Ch’u 
state,  208 ; his  death  and  last 
advice,  210. 

Kuan-tzi:  work  of  the  pldlosopher 
so-called ; see  Kuan-tzi,  the 
philosopher. 

Kuan  Yin  : legend  of  his  farewell  to 
Lau-tzi,  307. 

Kuan-yin,  the  ‘‘Holy  Virgin”:  orig- 
inally a male  deity,  149. 

Kuan-yin-tzi : 307. 

K’uang-wang,  the  Emperor;  220, 
332. 

Kiihnert,  F. : 40. 

Kui:  see  Badge  op  jade. 

Kui-chu : see  Hien,  Duke  op  Tsin. 

Kui-ki : a sacred  mountain,  120. 

Kui-ku-tzi:  128,  285,  307-308. 

Kui,  the  Emperor  : see  Kie. 

Kun  barbarians  (Huns)  : 68,  70,  169. 

Kun  : minister  of  works  under  Yau 
and  father  of  the  Emperor  Yii, 
31 ; fails  to  stay  deluge,  31-35. 

K’un-lun,  Mount : 144r-151. 

Kung  (=  duke)  : 98. 

Kung-ho  period  : 157,  176,  332. 

Kung-kung : smashes  the  vault  of 
heaven,  9. 

Kung  Liu : an  ancestor  of  the  Ch6u 
emperors,  168. 

Kung-sun  Tzi-ch’an  : see  Tzi-ch’an. 

Kung-sun  Yen,  statesman,  breaks  up 
confederation  against Ts’in,  313. 

Kung-wang,  the  Emperor  : 152-153, 
331. 


366 


INDEX 


Kung-yang  Kau : his  commentary 
on  the  Ch’un-is’iu,  180. 

K’ung,  dukes  of : in  K’ii-f6u,  de- 
scendants of  Confucius,  228. 

K’ung-fu-tzi  and  K’ung  K’iu : see 
Confucius. 

K’ung  Kia : an  ancestor  of  Con- 
fucius, 228;  murdered,  229. 

Kuo-tzi : see  Sons  of  the  Empire. 

Kuo-yii : 155. 

Lacouperie,  T.  de : on  the  Western 
origin  of  Chinese  civilization, 
14-18,  32 ; on  the  extent  of 
Mu-wang’s  peregrinations,  149- 
150. 

Lacquer  industry : that  of  Foochow 
a family  secret,  117. 

Ladders,  hooked ; used  in  assault 
of  a fortress,  165. 

Lances:  see  Weapons. 

Landholders  : rank  first  in  popula- 
tion, 110. 

Land  tenure ; 296-298 ; laws  of, 
changed  under  Shi-huang-ti,  298. 

Lan-t’i6n  (Shen-si)  : birthplace  of 

Hua-sii,  the  Emperor  Fu-hi’s 
mother,  8. 

Largeteau,  M. : on  the  Shu-king 

eclipse,  41. 

Latinized  names  of  sages  (Confucius, 
Mencius,  Micius,  Licius) : 281. 

Lau-shang,  Great  Khan  of  the  Hiung- 
nu : 271. 

Lau-tzi : name  and  life  of,  231-232 ; 
possibly  of  foreign  birth,  231, 
269 ; interviewed  by  Confucius, 
232,  240-241,  243;  his  doctrine 
as  starting-point  of  an  indigenous 
religion,  237 ; his  Tau-td-king, 
238-240,  305 ; Legge’s  and 

Giles’,  the  positive  and  sceptical 
views  of,  238;  difficulty  of  re- 
constructing system  from  his 
sayings,  239-240 ; compared 
with  Confucius,  240-241 ; Giles 
on,  300;  some  undisputed  sen- 
tences from  his  sayings,  300-301 ; 
bids  farewell  to  Kuan  Yin  at 
the  Han-ku  Pass,  307,  313. 

Lau-tzi  and  Confucius,  the  age  of : 
227-257. 


Law:  administration  of,  123-124; 
forbidding  states  to  cross  each 
other’s  boundaries  except  by 
emperor’s  orders,  207 ; Con- 
fucius’ method,  245. 

Legge,  James : his  edition  of  the 
Chinese  classics,  26,  note  1 ; 
on  Yii’s  engineering  exploits, 
34,  36-38 ; translation  of  the 
Bamboo  Books,  51,  note  1,  53- 
55,  56-57 ; on  south-pointing 
chariots,  128 ; on  Si-wang-mu, 
151 ; on  customs  of  the  ancient 
Chinese,  translated  by,  after 
Biot,  162-167 ; his  year  dates 
B.c.  differ  from  those  of  astrono- 
mers, 174;  on  the  eclipse  of 
776  B.C.,  175;  on  gap  in  Shu- 
king’s  account  of  emperors, 
178;  eulogizes  Tso-chuan,  180; 
his  lecture  on  Huan  of  Ts’i 
and  Won  of  Tsin,  206-217 ; on 
Confucius’  family,  229 ; on 
Tau-td-king,  238 ; on  Tzi-lu, 
248;  on  Confucius’  personal 
life,  256-257 ; on  Yang  Chu  and 
Mo  Ti,  277,  note  1,  278, 282,  note 
1 ; see  also  the  several  classics 
quoted  from  his  edition  under 
their  respective  titles. 

Legitimacy  of  throne  rights : began 
to  be  recognized  after  Ti-k’i,  39 ; 
respected  by  Chung-k’ang,  39 ; 
based  according  to  Shu-king  on 
the  authority  of  God,  79,  100 ; 
on  the  example  set  by  the  peo- 
ple’s ancestors,  82,  100-101,  218  ; 
and  individual  merit,  101-102 ; 
Ch6u-kung  main  spokesman  of 
absolute,  137 ; of  emperor’s 
position  loyally  supported  by 
Duke  Huan  of  Ts’i,  207,  209, 
217 ; respect  of,  holds  together 
Ch6u  dynasty,  217-218 ; recog- 
nized by  victorious  dynasty  by 
giving  high  appointments  to 
members  of  ruined  house,  see 
Wu-KONG  and  Wei-tzi. 

Lei-tsu,  the  Empress  : 22. 

Let-won:  see  Thunder  pattern. 

Li,  ..son  of  Confucius  : 230,  248. 

Li  ir  : see  Lau-tzi. 


INDEX 


367 


Li-jung  : a wild  tribe,  212,  213. 

lA-ki:  163,  252. 

Li  Lvmg-mi6n,  artist  and  collector ; 
helps  to  illustrate  and  bring  out 
a work  on  ancient  art,  73. 

Li-sau,  the  poem  : 315-316. 

Li-shan  : a hill  famous  for  an  attack 
by  the  Huns  on  Yu-wang,  169. 

Li  Ssi,  anti-Confucianist : 326. 

Li  T’ang  (Japanese  Rito)  artist;  89. 

Li-wang,  the  Emperor : 154,  332 ; 
driven  away  by  the  people,  157, 
159. 

Liang,  Mount : separates  T’ai-wang’s 
old  and  new  residences,  69. 

Liau  barbarians : wanderings  of 

the,  193-194. 

Licius  (=  Li5-tzi)  : 281. 

Ld6-tzi  (the  book)  : see  Lie-tzi,  the 

PHILOSOPHER. 

Li6-tzi,  the  philosopher : on  the  Si- 
wang-mu  legend,  146 ; his  work 
may  be  fictitious,  276 ; referred 
to  by  Chuang-tzi  and  Mencius, 
277  and  note  1,  281. 

Lid-wang,  the  Emperor : 274,  332. 

Life  after  death : reward  for  virtue, 
82 ; cf.  Hell  and  purgatory. 

Life,  value  of ; Yang  Chu  on  the, 
277-278. 

Lin-i:  127. 

Ling,  Duke  of  Wei ; 246-247,  248, 
347. 

Ling,  Duke  of  Tsin  : 220,  335. 

Ling-wang,  the  Emperor : 227,  332. 

Liu  An,  author  : 270. 

Liu-kuo:  see  “Six  States,”  the. 

Liu-sha  (“The  Moving  Sands”)  : see 
Sl-WANG-MU. 

Livestock  holders  : how  ranking  in 

population,  110. 

Livy : describes  custom  the  Boians 
had  in  common  with  the  Hiung- 
nu,  271. 

Lo  or  Lo-yang : imperial  capital 

built  by  Ch’ong-wang,  136, 
169,  177 ; see  also  Tung-tu. 

Loadstone:  128,  131,  132,  135. 

Lob-nor : 146,  147. 

Loyalty : example  of,  set  by  Ch6u- 
kung,  137 ; Duke  Huan’s,  to 
the  emperor,  207;  offenses  in. 


according  to  Mencius,  293-295 ; 
see  also  Legitimacy  of  throne 

RIGHTS. 

Lii : family  name  of  the  original 
princes  of  Ts’i,  339. 

Lii  Pu-wei : prime  minister  of  Ts’in, 
career  of,  323-328. 

Lu,  the  state  of : treatment  of  pris- 
oners of  war  in,  165  ; history  of, 
described  in  Ch’un-ts’iu  and 
T so-chuan,  179,  197 ; Jung 

tribes  make  inroads  on,  187 ; 
as  an  inland  state  could  not 
extend  its  territory,  188 ; Con- 
fucius a native  of,  229 ; Duke 
Chau  of,  patronizes  Confucius, 
230;  Confucius’  sojourn  in, 
243,  244-246,  248;  Duke  Chau 
of,  an  exile  in  Ts’i,  243-244 ; 
Duke  Ting  of,  244—246 ; Con- 
fucius’ influence  on  government 
of,  246;  Wu  K’i  studies  warfare 
and  becomes  military  leader  in, 
274;  Mencius  a native  of,  274; 
and  ends  his  days  in,  287-288 ; 
dukes  of,  never  became  kings, 
315;  annexed  by  Ch’u,  326, 
341 ; princes  of,  340-341. 

Lu-fu : see  Wu-kong. 

Lun-yii  ( “ Confucian  Analects  ”)  : 26, 
note  1,  253-254,  255. 

Lung-mon  (in  North  China)  : sup- 
posed home  of  primeval  em- 
perors, 5. 

Luxury  of  rich  men  described  by 
Yang  Chu;  277,  note  1. 

Macklin,  Dr.  W.  E. : on  Mencius, 
291. 

Magnetic  needle:  see  Mariners’ 
Compass. 

Mailed  warriors : 163. 

Mailla,  Father  de : on  Kung-wang, 
153 ; author  of  a voluminous 
“History  of  China,”  265. 

Ma  Ki  (tenth  century)  on  Si-wang- 
mu : 151. 

Man  barbarians:  defeated  near  Lake 
Tung-t’ing  by  Suan-wang,  171 ; 
rulers  of  the  Ch’u  state  call 
themselves,  191 ; occupy  the 
south  of  China  and  possibly 


368 


INDEX 


territories  south  of  it,  192-194 ; 
their  wanderings  from  north  to 
south,  193 ; bronze  drums  of 
the,  195-196;  see  also  Ch’u, 

THE  STATE  OF. 

Man:  personal  name  of  Mu-wang, 
144. 

Manuscripts  buried  in  tombs : 50. 

Maps  and  charts  of  the  Empire  : 119, 
125. 

Mariners’  Compass : origin  of,  126- 
136. 

Marriage  : introduced  by  Fu-hi,  9 ; 
special  officer  in  charge  of,  115- 
116;  between  parties  of  same 
surname  treated  as  incest,  152 ; 
among  the  Huns,  168 ; between 
Chinese  and  foreign  tribes,  212, 
213,  269 ; with  several  wives 
apparently  on  equal  terms,  215. 

Martin,  W.  A.  P.,  on  Su  Ts’in:  310. 

Mastiff,  the  Tibetan : possibly  the 
prototype  of  the  T’au-t’i5  mon- 
ster, 87. 

Matriarchy : see  Matrimony. 

Matrimony : introduced  by  Fu-hi, 
9,  14,  60 ; see  also  Marriage. 

Mau-tun,  i.q.  Baghatur,  “hero,” 
an  early  sovereign  of  the  Hiung- 
nu  (Huns)  ; 161,  185;  probably 
one  of  King  Attila’s  ancestors, 
185-186. 

Mayers,  W.  F. : chronological  tables, 
7,  note  2,  17 ; on  Si-wang-mu, 
146. 

Ma  Y iian  (Japanese  Bayen),  artist : 
89. 

Mean,  Doctrine  of  the : see  Chung- 

YUNG. 

Medicine : early  efforts  in,  ascribed 
to  Shon-nung,  10-11. 

Meeting  of  princes  : under  Wu-wang, 
103 ; under  I^-wang,  154 ; em- 
peror’s power  to  preside  over, 
delegated  to  Duke  Huan  of  Ts’i, 
207 ; Huan  overrules  emperor’s 
decision  by  a,  209 ; and  ex- 
presses lus  loyalty  in  another, 
209,  218;  “the  Five  Articles” 
agreed  upon  in,  210 ; presided 
over  by  Duke  Won  of  Tsin, 
when  the  emperor  is  required  to 


attend,  216;  under  Ch’ong- 
wang  represented  on  wall  paint- 
ing, 243  ; under  Li6-wang,  275. 

Megalomania,  national : 112. 

Mei-hi : the  Emperor  Ki6’s  para- 
mour, 43. 

Mencius : on  Won-wang,  68 ; on 

T’ai-wang’s  migration,  68-69 ; 
calls  Yii,  Confucius,  and  Ch6u- 
kung  the  “Three  Sages, ”137  ; eu- 
logizes Yii  and  Ch6u-kung,  138; 
on  “the  Five  Articles  ” fixing 
principles  of  government,  210 ; 
criticizes  Tzi-ch’an,  232-233; 
work  bearing  lus  name  Mong-tzi, 
255 ; a native  of  Lu,  274 ; refers 
to  Li6-tzi,  277 ; opposed  to 
Yang  Chu  and  Mo  Ti,  276,  282; 
his  life,  his  mother,  282-284 ; 
opposes  anti-Confucian  spirit 
of  his  time,  serves  and  declines 
salary  in  Ts’i,  286 ; his  relations 
to  King  Hui  of  Liang,  sojourn 
in  Ts’i,  Sung  and  Lu,  287 ; his 
death,  288 ; liis  views  on  Ufe, 
government,  and  political  econ- 
omy, 288-289 ; his  method  of 
arguing,  290-292 ; an  educator 
in  morals,  292-293 ; his  pohtical 
views,  293-296 ; better  expo- 
nent of  Confucianism  than  the 
master  himself,  299. 

Merchants  : how  ranking  according 
to  the  Chdu-li,  110;  Lau-tzi  on, 
240. 

Meyer  and  Foy  : 196,  note  2. 

Mi : old  family  name  of  the  sovereigns 
of  Ch’u,  189. 

Mi,  the  Duke  of  : 152. 

Miau-tzi  (aborigines  of  Southwest 
China)  : derive  their  origin  from 
the  banished  San-miau  tribes, 
86,  196;  from  P’an-hu,  194. 

Micius  : see  Mo  Ti. 

Middle  Kingdom  (chung-kuo)  : origin 
of  the  term,  137. 

Migration : of  Chinese  nation  in 

prehistoric  and  legendary  period, 
8 ; alleged,  from  Babylonia  to 
China,  14-18 ; from  Khotan, 
18-20 ; T’an-fu  and  his  people’s, 
from  Pin  to  Ch6u,  see  T’an-fu; 


INDEX 


369 


of  Tangutans,  Tibetans,  and 
Miau-tzi  from  Central  China 
to  their  later  seats,  86 ; of  Man 
barbarians,  193. 

Millet:  122. 

Min,  King  of  Ts’i : 318-319,  340. 

Ministers  and  advisers  : partiality  of 
historians  in  ascribing  great 
decisions  to,  33,  34. 

Minister,  prime  (ta-tsai)  : 110-111. 

Miracles  : an  ill-portending  mulberry 
tree,  48 ; a minister  selected  by 
emperor’s  dream,  53 ; several, 
mentioned  in  Bamboo  Books, 
53-55 ; dreams,  visions,  etc.,  in 
history  of  Chau  state,  270. 

Mirrors,  bronze,  alloys  of : 126. 

Model  emperor  lore  of  Shu-king: 
how  originated,  33. 

Mong  Au,  Ts’in  general:  328. 

Mong-ch’ang-kiin  : one  of  the  “Four 
Nobles,”  diplomatic  agent  in 
Ts’in,  317  ; turns  against  Ts’in, 
serving  his  native  state,  Ts’i, 
318,  321. 

M ong-k’i-pi-t’an : 132,  note  1. 

Mong  K’o  : see  Mencius. 

Mong-tsin  (the  ford  of  Mong)  : 55 ; 
Wu-wang’s  manifesto  to  his 
army  at,  63-65. 

Mong-tz'i:  see  Mencius. 

Money  : see  Exchange,  means  op. 

Monopohes,  origin  of  the  salt  and 
iron : 203-205. 

Monotheism : see  God  ; Sacrifice 
TO  God  (Shang-ti). 

Moon,  the : as  an  object  of  worship, 
79. 

Mo  Ti : the  philosopher  of  mutual 
love,  280-282. 

Mo-tzi : see  Mo  Ti,  the  philosopher. 

Mountains,  sacred : as  objects  of 

worship,  79,  120-122. 

Mourning  : period  of  three  years’,  not 
counted  as  office  by  historians, 
31 ; spent  in  preparing  for 
duties  of  government,  47  ; Con- 
fucius’ respect  for  persons  in, 
256 ; Confucius  exaggerates,  230 ; 
Mencius’,  for  his  mother,  287 ; 
Chuang-tzi  says,  “real,  grieves 
in  silence,”  304. 

2 B 


Mu,  Duke  of  Ts’in : according  to 
Chavannes,  identical  with  Mu- 
t’i6n-tzi  of  the  Si-wang-mu 
legend,  151 ; fourth  among  the 
“Five  Leaders,”  206,  219,  333. 

Mulberry  tree,  an  ill-portending  : 48. 

Murder,  political : attempted  by 

means  of  unsafe  boats,  143. 

Music  : instruments  of  wood  and  silk 
thread  constructed  by  Fu-hi,  9; 
the  shong,  or  reed  organ,  in- 
vented by  Nii-kua,  9 ; construc- 
tion of  instruments  of,  leads  to 
system  of  weights  and  measures, 
22,  23 ; a drum  hung  before  the 
Emperor  Shun’s  gate,  32;  court 
musicians  and  singers  under  the 
Ch6u  dynasty  selected  from  the 
blind,  125 ; drums  in  military 
use,  165 ; big  drum  sounded  on 
approach  of  enemy,  176 ; Con- 
fucius impressed  by,  243 ; see 
also  Bronze  drums. 

Musicians,  court : 125. 

Mu-t’i6n-tzi  (“Mu,  the  Son  of 
Heaven  ”) : 145. 

Mu-t’ien-tzi-chuan : 145,  148-149. 

Mu-wang,  the  Emperor : 144-152, 

169,  269,  331. 

Mythological  Period  : 3-26,  329. 

Nakhunte,  Kudur,  of  the  Baby- 
lonians : referred  to  Huang-ti 
by  De  Lacouperie,  17-18. 

Names,  clans,  and  by-names  not 
known  among  the  Huns  : 168. 

Nan  { — baron)  : 98. 

Nan-chung : name  of  two  generals 
referred  to  in  the  Shi-king,  also 
in  inscription  of  812  b.c.,  161. 

Nan-ts’i-shu : 130,  note  1. 

Nan-tzi,  the  ill-reputed  Duchess  of 
Wei,  246-247,  248. 

Nan-wang,  the  Emperor : 314—321, 
325,  326,  332. 

Nan-yii4,  the  state  of  : 196,  227. 

Needles  : among  necessaries  of  life  in 
seventh  century  b.c.,  204. 

Nest-builders  : 5,  6,  329. 

Niau-tsi-won  (“script  of  birds’  foot- 
prints”) : see  Writing,  art  of. 

Nine  Tripods,  the  (kiur-ting) : corre- 


370 


INDEX 


spend  to  nine  provinces  of  Yii, 
36,  90 ; taken  possession  of  by 
Wu-wang,  98 ; as  emblems  of 
imperial  dignity  ridievded  by  a 
vassal,  221 ; history  and  sym- 
bolic power  of,  described  by 
Ting-wang,  221-222 ; seized  by 
the  King  of  Ts’in,  325;  loss  of, 
forfeits  title  of  “Son  of  Heaven,” 
326. 

Nobles,  the  Four : see  Four  Nobles, 

THE. 

Nobility,  the  five  grades  of ; regu- 
lated by  Wu-wang,  98;  see  also 
Chu-h6u. 

Nomadic  life:  imder  Fu-hi,  9-14; 
under  Huang-ti,  13 ; of  the 
Huns,  168. 

Nii-kua,  the  Emperor:  Fu-hi ’s  co- 
regent or  successor,  9 ; repairs 
vault  of  heaven,  10. 

Oath  : legalized  by  blood  of  animal, 
124,  271. 

Oppolzer,  T.  von : on  the  Shu-king 
eclip.se,  41. 

Old-Turkish  stone  inscriptions  : 184, 
note  1. 

Oracles : see  Divination. 

Origin  of  Chinese  race : not  known, 
3-4,  8 ; oldest  names  ascribed 
to  prehistoric  period  belong  to 
northwestern  China,  4,  5 ; re- 
ferred to  Babylonia,  14-18 ; to 
, Khotan,  18-20. 

Ou-yang  Siu : on  the  “ Stone  Drums 
of  the  Ch6u  dynasty,”  171. 

Ox  : the  Emperor  Shon-nung  repre- 
sented with  head  of,  10. 

Oxen : said  to  have  been  first  used 
by  Huang-ti  tor  drawing  carts, 
22 ; produced  in  Ordos  territory 
and  North  Shan-si,  122 ; bag- 
gage-cars drawn  by,  in  war,  164 ; 
with  horses  and  sheep  reared  by 
the  Huns,  168. 

Pa-kua,  symbols  of  oldest  system  of 
Chinese  philosophy : invention 
of,  ascribed  to  Fu-hi,  9 ; de- 
scription of,  59-61 ; as  means  of 
auguration,  118;  see  also  I-king. 


Pages  : see  Sons  of  the  Empire. 

Pai,  or  po  (“hundred”):  as  a nu- 
merical term  denoting  totality, 
15. 

Pai^hu-t’uruj : 60. 

Palace  : first,  built  by  Huang-ti,  21 ; 
emperor’s,  during  the  Ch6u 
dynasty,  114-115. 

Pan  Ku,  historian  : 60. 

P’an-hu : legendary  ancestor  of  the 
Man  barbarians,  194. 

P’an-kong,  the  Emperor  : 53,  82,  83, 
100-101,  331. 

P’an-ku : first  human  being,  4,  329. 

Paravey,  le  Chevalier  de : cited  by 
M.  Huber  as  identif3ung  Si- 
wang-mu  with  the  Queen  of 
Sheba  in  1853,  151,  note  2.  [I 
find  that  Paravey  first  wrote  on 
the  subject  in  1839 ; see  his  “ Dis- 
sertation sur  les  Amazones,'! 
Paris,  1840,  p.  15.  F.  H.] 

Pardon  : the  sovereign’s  right,  123. 

Parker,  E.  H. : 130. 

Parliamentary  power,  traces  of : 124. 

Pau,  the  state  of : 171. 

Pau-hi : see  Fu-hi. 

Pau-shi:  an  oflficer  with  censorial 
functions,  116. 

Pau  Ssi : sultana  of  Yu-wang,  169, 
171-174,  176-177. 

Pear-tree,  the  sweet : symbol  of 
people’s  love,  139. 

Pedigrees : extended  to  legendary 

emperors,  99,  191,  228. 

Pei-jung  tribes  : 187. 

Penal  code : that  of  Ch6u  dynasty 
comparatively  humane,  123. 

People’s  voice,  the,  in  important 
decisions  : 124. 

Pessimism  : see  Yang  Chu. 

Pheasants : represented  on  oldest 

bronzes,  88;  offered  as  tribute, 
127,  128. 

Phenix,  the,  on  bronzes  : see  Dragon. 

Philosophers,  minor  : 264,  305-308. 

Philosophy : Chinese  natural,  based 
on  male  and  female  principles, 
59-62;  Yit-izi,  “the  Philosopher 
Yii,”  possibly  oldest  work  on, 
59,  note  1,  192 ; difficulty  of 
translating  works  of,  239-240; 


INDEX 


371 


flourishing  at  time  of  political 
troubles,  262 ; some  philoso- 
phers’works  throw  light  on,  and 
reflect  spirit  of.  Contending 
States,  264,  276 ; statesmen  and 
diplomats  study,  285 ; applica- 
tion of,  to  affairs  of  government, 
295-296;  texts  of,  305-307; 
classification  of  works  of,  306 ; 
minor  works  of,  compiled  or 
added  to  by  later  writers,  307 ; 
see  also  Confucianists  ; Cndu- 
kung;  Han-fei;  Kuan-tzi; 
Mo  Ti ; Sun  Wu  ; Sun  K’uang  ; 
Tauists;  Won- WANG ; WuK’i; 
YangChu;  Yu-hiung. 

Pi : see  Gem,  the  sacred. 

Pi-kan  ; killed  by  Ch6u-sin,  63. 

Pin ; residence  of  the  dukes  of  Ch6u 
before  T’an-fu’s  migration,  58, 
68,  169. 

Pines ; 122. 

P’ing,  Duke  of  Lu : 341 ; and  Men- 
cius, 287. 

P’ing-ch6u-k’o-t’an:  133. 

P’ing-wang,  the  Emperor  : 177,  332. 

P’ing-yiian-kun : one  of  the  “Four 
Nobles,”  321. 

Piton,  Ch. : on  Su  Ts’in  and  Chang  I, 
311,  note  1. 

Ploughs  : of  iron  in  seventh  century 
B.C.,  204. 

Pdn-ts’au-yen-i;  131. 

Poetry,  Chinese  : difficulty  of  trans- 
lation, 239-240;  see  also  Shi- 
KiNG  and  K’ij  Yuan. 

Po  ( = earl)  : 98. 

Po-fu : Yu-wang’s  son  by  his  sul- 
tana Pau-ssi,  172. 

Po-i,  ancestor  of  the  princes  of  Ts’in  : 
153. 

Po  K’i,  commander  of  Ts’in : 318- 
323  ; besieges  Shang-tang,  321 ; 
commits  suicide,  322. 

Po-ku-t’u-lu : 73. 

Po-yang : court  astronomer  under 
Yu-wang,  172. 

Po-}di : see  Li,  son  of  Confucius. 

Police  functions : 124. 

Population:  nine  ranks  of,  110;  cen- 
sus of,  how  taken,  119;  has 
share  in  important  decisions  in 


public  matters,  124 ; transfer  of, 
away  from  original  homes,  124 ; 
mixed  character  in,  of  boundary 
states,  267-268. 

Porcelain : see  Pottery. 

Pottery : in  the  East  and  in  Europe 
it  has  derived  models  from 
Shang  and  Ch6u  sacrificial 
bronzes,  84. 

Prayer  by  substitute  : 103. 

Prehistoric  lore : 3-7,  235-237. 

Pride,  Chinese  national : origin  of, 

112. 

“Princes  of  the  Empire”:  see 

Chu-h6u. 

Products  of  provinces  : 120-122. 

Professions,  the  nine  : 110. 

Pro\'inces : empire  divided  into, 

under  Huang-ti,  21 ; nine  cre- 
ated under  Chuan-hii,  25 ; nine 
imder  Yii,  36,  37 ; pictorially 
represented  by  Nine  Tripods, 
90 ; according  to  the  Chdu-li, 
119-122. 

P’u : city  in  the  state  of  Tsin,  now 
province  of  Shan-si,  212,  213. 

Quipu : see  Knot-writing. 

Quivers : 164. 

Rain,  praying  for  : 36. 

Red : declared  the  national  color  of 
the  Ch6u  dynasty,  98. 

Reed  stalks  : as  instruments  of  divi- 
nation, 83. 

Revenue,  Board  of:  113;  see  also 
Taxes. 

Rice:  produced  in  Yang-ch6u,  120; 
in  Ts’ing-ch6u,  121. 

Richthofen,  Baron  F.  von : derives 
origin  of  Chinese  race  from 
Khotan,  18-20;  on  Shu-king, 
33;  on  the  Emperor  Yii’s  en- 
gineering works,  34,  38 ; his 
view  on  the  old  model  emperors, 
33-34;  on  the  Yii-kung;  his 
authority  in  Chinese  research 
limited,  38. 

Ririumin  : see  Li  Lung-mien. 

Roasting,  the  punishment  of : 53, 
57  and  note  1. 

Robber  Chi,  the  story  of  : 302-303. 


372 


INDEX 


Roman  Orient : inhabitants  of,  said 
by  native  author  to  be  hke 
Chinese,  19. 

Rulers,  the  Five  : 12. 

Rushes:  121. 

Sacks  : used  for  provisions  in  war,  164. 

Sacrifice : leading  feature  in  life  of 
nation  during  Shang  dynasty, 
83 ; viands  and  libations  used  as 
offerings,  84 ; sacrifice  to  God 
(Shang-ti),  first  introduced  by 
Fu-hi,  9 ; regulated  by  Huang-ti, 
13,  21 ; neglected  by  Shau-hau, 
24;  reorganized  by  Chuan-hii, 
25 ; dm-ing  the  Shang  and  Ch6u 
dynasties,  78-80,  118;  claimed 
as  the  emperor’s  privilege  by 
King  of  Ts’in,  326 ; sacrifice  to 
minor  deities,  80-81,  118;  see 
also  Mountains,  sacred  ; sac- 
rifice to  ancestors,  81-83,  118, 
177  ; see  also  Ancestors. 

Sacrificial  vessels  : see  Bronzes. 

Salt:  produced  in  Yu-ch6u  (Clii'-li), 
122 ; monopoly  created  by 
Kuan-tzi,  203-205. 

San-kiau  (“the  Three  Rehgions ’’)  : 
237-238. 

San-kuo-chi:  129,  note  1. 

San-miau  tribe:  banished  by  Yau, 
identified  by  some  with  T’au-t’i6 
monster,  85-87 ; supposed  ances- 
tors of  Tangutans,  Miau-tzi,  and 
Tibetans,  86,  196. 

San-Tsin  ( =The  Three  Tsin  States)  : 
264,  335-336. 

San-wei : locality  in  western  Kan-su, 
near  the  northern  boundary  of 
Tibet,  87,  145. 

School : established  under  Ti-k’u, 
25 ; the  Duke  of  Chou  (Won- 
wang)  builds  an  imperial  college, 
54 ; school  at  Wu-wang’s  capi- 
tal, 99 ; pliilosophical  school  of 
Kui-ku-tzi,  285,  307. 

Scythians : possibly  Hunnic  tribes, 
185. 

Self-culture : the  subject  of  the 

Ta-hio,  254 ; recommended  by 
Mencius,  292. 

Sericulture : see  Silk. 


Servants  : rank  eighth  in  population, 

110. 

Seven  Heroes,  the  : see  Ts’i-hiung. 

Sha-ch6u  : eastern  terminus  of  tract 
known  as  liu-sha,  147. 

Sha-k’iu : one  of  Ch6u-sin’s  resi- 

dences, in  the  present  Chi-li, 
57. 

Shan-hai^king ; 146. 

Shan-jung  (=“Hill”  Jung):  a 

[Mongolic  7]  branch  of  the  Huns, 

168,  187 ; Duke  Huan  of  Ts’i’s 
expedition  against,  207. 

Shan-yii : title  of  the  Great  Khan 
of  the  Huns,  66,  167 ; see  also 
Huns. 

Shang,  Duke  of  Sung : 229,  342. 

Shang  dynasty,  the : 47-91 ; 330- 
331 ; its  records  consist  chiefly 
of  emperors’  names,  49;  its 
culture,  71-91 ; causes  of  its 
downfall,  69-70 ; destroyed  with 
the  assistance  of  Tartar  tribes, 

169,  183 ; probably  first  his- 
torical period,  252. 

Shang  Jung : former  minister  of 

Ch6u-sin,  assists  Wu-wang  in 
government,  95. 

Shang-tang : city  in  the  state  of 

Chau,  the  present  Lu-an-fu  in 
Shan-si,  321. 

Shang-ti,  “the  Supreme  Ruler”: 
see  God. 

Shau-hau,  the  Emperor  : 24,  329. 

Shau-k’ang,  the  Emperor : 42,  330; 
his  successors,  330. 

Shau-kung  ( = Duke  of  Shau) : 
(1)  prime  minister  to  K’ang- 
wang,  138 ; his  popularity  eulo- 
gized in  the  Shi-king,  139 ; min- 
ister to  Chau-wang,  143 ; first 
prince  of  Yen,  338;  (2)  prime 
minister  to  Li-wang,  advocates 
freedom  of  speech,  154-155 ; 
shields  Li-wang ’s  son,  Siian- 
wang,  against  revolutionists  and 
becomes  his  minister,  157. 

Shau-ti<5n  : supposed  father  of  Shon- 
nung  and  Huang-ti,  12. 

Sheba,  Queen  of : identified  with 

Si-wang-mu  by  Professor  Forke, 
150-151 ; also  by  Paravey,  151. 


INDEX 


373 


Sheep : used  among  the  Huns  by 
children  in  the  practice  of 
riding,  168. 

Shen-si  and  Kan-su : the  cradle  of 
Chinese  civilization,  4. 

Shi,  Prince  of  : 101. 

Shi  Hu,  the  Emperor  ; 130,  135. 

Shi-huang-ti : causes  works  of  litera- 
ture to  be  consigned  to  oblivion, 
71 ; calls  himself  “The  First 
Emperor,  ” 97 ; changes  in  cul- 
tural life  under,  prepared  cen- 
turies before  liim,  270;  changes 
conditions  of  land  tenure,  298 ; 
his  paternity  and  succession  to 
the  Ts’in  throne,  324,  327-328; 
see  also  Chong. 

Shi-ir-chi : see  Cyclical  characters. 

Shi-kan : see  Cyclical  characters. 

Shi-ki,  Ssi-ma  Ts’i6n’s  history  of 
early  periods  (translated  by 
Ed.  Chavannes)  : on  Huang-ti, 
7,  12,  13;  on  emperors’  fief 
names,  17 ; its  praises  of  model 
emperors,  29 ; its  chronology 
beginning  from  841  b.c.,  51 ; 
on  Ch6u-sin,  56;  on  culture 
of  Shang  period,  76 ; on  San- 
miau’s  banishment,  86 ; dates 
decline  of  imperial  power  from 
Chau-wang,  143 ; on  the  Duke 
of  Mi's  three  wives,  152  ; on  the 
name  Ts’i6n-m6u;  silent  on 
Siian-wang’s  wars  against  the 
Huns,  158 ; on  early  history 
and  life  of  the  Huns,  167-170 ; 
on  Yu-wang  and  Pau  Ssi,  172 ; 
ignores  eclipse  of  776  b.c.,  176 ; 
on  emperor’s  duty  to  sacrifice 
to  ancestors,  177 ; dates  decay 
of  imperial  authority  from  P’ing- 
wang,  178 ; on  the  genealogy  of 
Hunnic  sovereigns,  186 ; on 
Chau-wang’s  death,  189 ; on 
the  princes  of  Ch’u,  191-192; 
on  the  descendants  of  Kuan- 
tzi,  205;  on  Lau-tzi,  231,  240; 
mentions  the  Sunr-tzi,  234 ; its 
chapter  on  Confucian  Disciples, 
249 ; throws  light  on  history 
of  Contending  States,  264 ; its 
history  of  the  Chau  state,  269- 


273  ; on  Hi6n-wang,  275 ; refers 
to  Kui-ku-tzi  as  a teacher,  308 ; 
on  Su  Ts’in,  309,  310,  313;  on 
Prince  I-jon’s  flight  from  Han- 
tan,  324. 

Shi-king,  or  “Book of  Odes”:  ballad 
referring  to  H6u-tsi,  26 ; con- 
tains no  mention  of  Yau  and 
Shun,  55 ; portions  of,  among 
the  oldest  products  of  Chinese 
hterature,  59 ; throws  light  on 
Shang  culture,  74,  76 ; oldest 
ode  in,  referred  to  eighth  century 
B.C.,  76 ; allegorical  poem  as- 
cribed to  Ch6u-kung,  105 ; the 
term  “Middle  Kingdom  ” occurs 
in,  137;  ode  on  the  “Sweet 
Pear  Tree,”  139;  many  of  its 
satirical  poems  refer  to  I*-wang, 
153 ; its  account  of  a battle 
against  the  Huns,  158-160 ; 
ode  referring  to  Won-wang’s 
wars  against  the  Huns,  161 ; 
extract  from  Legge’s  transla- 
tion of  Edouard  Biot’s  analysis 
of  odes  throwing  light  on  mode 
of  warfare,  162-166  ; compared 
to  Homeric  epics  as  a source  of 
history,  166 ; rhymes  of,  throw 
fight  on  ancient  sounds  of  the 
language,  167 ; eclipse  men- 
tioned in,  confirmed  by  Western 
astronomers,  173-174;  edited 
by  Confucius,  252 ; highest  in 
estimation  among  works  of 
poetry,  316. 

Ships  and  boats : under  Huang-ti, 
22 ; south-pointing,  allusion  to, 
during  Tsin  dynasty,  130 ; boat 
used  for  political  murder,  143. 

Shon,  Marquis  of : 169,  172,  177. 

Shon-i-king : 86. 

Shon-kua,  encyclopaedist : 132,  136. 

Shon-nung,  the  Emperor : 10,  329 ; 
his  appearance ; introduces  field 
labor  and  botany,  10 ; descend- 
ants of,  appointed  fief-holders 
under  Wu-wang,  99;  his  time 
coincides  vnth  stone  age,  236. 

Shdn-nung-pon-ts’au-king : 10-1 1 . 

Shon-tsing-wang,  the  Emperor  : 313, 
332. 


374 


INDEX 


Shong,  the  reed  organ : invented  by 
Nii-kua,  9. 

Schopenhauer’s  pessimism  compared 
with  Yang  Chu’s:  279. 

Sh6u-ch’un,  an  eastern  capital  of 
the  state  of  Ch’u  : see  Map. 

Shu  (=  Ssi-ch’uan)  ; conquered  by 
Ts’in,  314. 

Shu-king  (“the  Book  of  History”): 
its  record  of  Yau  and  Shun  a 
“Mirror  of  Princes,”  29;  early 
knowledge  of  astronomy  be- 
trayed in,  throws  doubt  on  the 
tradition,  30 ; its  account  of 
Shun,  31 ; of  Yii,  32-38 ; oldest 
source  of  pre-Confucian  history, 
33 ; its  compilation  ascribed 
to  Confucius,  33,  251-252 ; its 
tradition  differs  from  that  of 
the  Bamboo  Books,  51 ; P’an- 
kong’s  views  on  government  re- 
corded in,  52 ; suspicious  for 
periods  preceding  Ch6u-sin,  55- 
56,  76-77 ; quotes  names  of 
foreign  tribes  assisting  Wu- 
wang,  69-70;  as  a source  for 
knowledge  of  cultural  life  before 
Ch6u  dynasty,  76 ; contains 
traces  of  monotheism,  78-80; 
of  cult  of  minor  deities,  80 ; 
of  ancestor  worship,  81-83 ; of 
sacrificial  service,  83;  P’an- 
kong’s  argument  why  the  nation 
should  be  loyal  to  him,  100-101 ; 
Ch6u-kung’s  ideas  about  God, 
one’s  ancestors,  and  one’s  own 
merit,  101-102 ; Ch6u-kung’s 
prayer  for  Wu-wang’s  recovery, 
102-103 ; Ch’ong-wang’s  speech 
appointing  Wei-tzi  prince  of 
Sung,  106-107 ; contains  two 
chapters  on  the  fundamental  in- 
stitutions of  government,  107 ; 
contains  but  scanty  details  on 
Mu-wang,  144 ; the  name  K’un- 
lun  first  cited  in,  145 ; the  Jo- 
shui,  or  “Weak  Water,”  men- 
tioned in,  147 ; mainly  a series 
of  speeches  embodying  political 
wisdom,  156,  178;  closes  its 
account  of  Ch6u  emperors  with 
P’ing-wang ; gap  in  previous 


history,  178 ; Confucius’  con- 
nection with,  251-252 ; some 
religious  views  expressed  in, 
foreign  to  Confucian  school, 
253;  Mencius’  faith  in,  288. 

Shu-liang  Ho,  father  of  Confucius : 
229. 

Shu-yii,  Ch’ong-wang’s  brother  : in- 
vested with  Tsin,  266,  334. 

Shui-king-chu : 127. 

Shun,  the  Emperor : 31-32,  329 ; 
supposed  descendant  of  Chuan- 
hii,  25 ; selected  as  emperor 
from  the  masses,  31 ; his  love 
of  justice,  32 ; banishes  Kun  and 
appoints  Yii  to  regulate  deluge, 
32;  his  title  Yu-yiX,  32;  prac- 
tised divination,  83 ; banished 
certain  tribes,  or  personages, 
85 ; visited  by  Si-wang-mu, 
151  ; Po  I,  minister  under,  sup- 
posed ancestor  of  princes  of 
Ts’in,  153 ; wall  painting  of, 
243  ; as  represented  in  Shu-king, 
251 ; a descendant  of,  invested 
with  Ch’on  by  Wu-wang,  343; 
see  also  Yau  and  Shun. 

Shun-wei  (Shun-yii)  : name,  or  title, 
of  earliest  chiefs  of  the  Huns, 
possibly  standing  for  Shan-yii, 
167. 

Si-ch6u  (the  “ Western  Ch6u  ”)  : 
so-called  before  P’ing-wang,  179. 

Si-ling,  the  Lady  of : 22. 

Si-po,  “Chief  of  the  West”:  see 

Won- WANG. 

Si-wang-mu,  legend  of:  144-151. 

Siang,  Duke  of  Sung  : 219,  342. 

Siang,  Duke  of  Tsin  : 219,  335. 

Siang,  King  of  Ts’i : 319,  340. 

Siang-wang,  the  Emperor  : 218,  332. 

Siau-kia,  the  Emperor  : 48,  330. 

Siau-shi-  (“Small  Historian”):  125. 

Si6-yen-t’o : see  Sir-Tardush. 

Si6n-ts’in-chu-tzi-ho-pi6n : a collec- 

tion of  philosophical  texts,  305- 
306. 

Silk : Fu-hi  constructs  musical  in- 
struments of,  9 ; introduction 
of,  by  Lei-tsu,  22,  23;  pro- 
duced under  government  super- 
vision during  the  Chou  dynasty, 


INDEX 


375 


110;  brocades  of,  a trade 
monopoly  during  the  Han  dy- 
nasty, 117;  produced  in  Yii- 
ch6u,  121 ; textures  of,  produced 
in  Ping-chdu,  122 ; axle-trees  of 
chariots  and  bows  covered  with, 
164 ; torn  in  quantities  to  please 
a woman,  172. 

Silver  Island,  the  bronze  tripod  of : 
161. 

Sin-ling-kiin ; one  of  the  “Foin- 
Nobles,”  321;  raises  siege  of 
Han-tan,  322 ; unsuccessful  in 
last  attempt  to  break  the  power 
of  Ts’in,  328. 

Sin-po : minister  under  Chuang- 

wang,  201. 

Singers,  court ; 125. 

Sir-Tardush  : identical  with  the  Si6- 
yen-t’o  tribes  of  Cliinese  his- 
torians, 184,  note  1. 

“Six  States,”  the  (Yen,  Chau,  Han, 
Wei,  Ts’i,  and  Ch’u)  : in  alli- 
ance against  Ts’in,  310 ; ex- 
clude Ts’in  from  Han-ku  Pass, 
313 ; riding  on  horseback  not 
customary  before  time  of,  273. 

Skins : produced  in  King-ch6u  or 
Ch’u,  121,  214. 

Skull  of  enemy  used  as  drinking 
vessel ; 270-272. 

Soldiers  enhsted  for  hunting  pur- 
poses: 119. 

Son  of  Heaven : the  emperor’s  title 
from  high  antiquity,  95-96. 

Sons  of  the  Empire  (kuo-tzi)  : 116, 
117. 

Sophists,  Chinese : 307-308. 

Sounds,  ancient,  of  Chinese  syllables  : 
7,  167. 

South-pointing  ; chariots,  127,  135  ; 
ships,  130,  135 ; needle,  see 
Mariners’  Compass. 

Spades : of  iron  in  seventh  century 
B.C.,  204. 

Speeches  in  historical  texts ; 155- 
156. 

Speech,  liberty  of : advocated,  155. 

Spelling  of  Chinese  words  ; method 
adopted  in  present  work,  xv-xx, 
217,  note  1. 

Spirits : of  the  departed  supposed 


to  affect  lives  of  descendants, 
81-82,  100-102;  of  good  sov- 
ereigns and  ministers  live  in 
heaven,  82 ; see  also  Ancestors  ; 
Heaven. 

Spring,  Mandarin  of  (ch’un-kuan) : 
113,  117-119,  124. 

Ssi-ch’uan  province  : supposed  home 
of  the  Emperor  Yii,  33 ; con- 
quered by  Ts’in,  314. 

Ssl-hau;  see  Four  Nobles,  the. 

Ssi-kien  ( = pubUc  remonstrators) : 
116. 

Ssi-k’u-ts’iian-shu-tso-yau-tsung  - mu : 
see  Tsung-mu. 

Ssi-ma  Kuang,  historian : 264,  266, 
268. 

Ssi-ma  Ts’i^n  : see  Shi-ki. 

Ssi-shi  (=  court  instructors):  116. 

Ssi-shu  (“Four  Books”)  : 251,  253- 
255. 

Stars,  the  : as  objects  of  worship,  79. 

Statistics : early  traces  of  method 
in,  119-123,  203-205;  see  also 
Kuan-tzi. 

Steppe,  northern : Ping-ch6u  and 

Yung-ch6u,  nearest  territories 
to,  122. 

Stone  age,  the,  in  China : 236. 

Stone  Drums,  the,  of  the  Ch6u 
dynasty : 170. 

Succession,  order  of : Huang-ti  be- 
comes emperor  by  his  ability, 
12  ; the  eldest  born  disregarded, 
24;  election  from  another  fam- 
ily, 25,  34 ; emperor  deposed  by 
the  people,  26;  Yau  elected  to 
succeed  his  deposed  step-brother, 
26 ; throne  offered  to  a minister, 
and  then  to  Shun,  a man  of  the 
people,  31 ; Yii  selected  on  ac- 
count of  his  ability,  34 ; reluc- 
tantly appoints  his  son,  38-39 ; 
succession  regulated  by  God, 
79-80 ; by  the  king’s  ancestors, 
81-82;  people’s  share  in  decid- 
ing succession  to  heirless  thrones, 
124 ; rightful  heir  excluded 
from  throne  by  uncle  as  usurper, 
153,  218 ; legitimate,  insisted 
on  by  minister  against  emperor’s 
will,  201 ; crown-prince’s,  en- 


376 


INDEX 


forced  against  emperor’s  wish 
under  pressure  of  powerful 
vassal,  209 ; five  sons  of  five 
wives  disputing  over  throne  of 
Ts’i,  211 ; Duke  Won  of  Tsin 
induced  by  ruse  of  his  followers 
to  accept,  214;  disputed  by 
younger  brothers,  233,  263. 

Sun  K’uang,  philosopher ; governor 
in  Ch’u,  325 ; teacher  of  Han- 
fei-tzi  and  Li  Ssi,  326. 

Suan,  Queen  Dowager  and  Regent  of 
Ts’in  : 317,  319. 

Suan,  King  of  Ts’i : 340;  his  relations 
to  Mencius,  286. 

Suan-wang,  the  Emperor  : 157-171, 
332. 

Sii6-shan  in  Kan-su : supposed  seat 
of  Si-wang-mu,  150. 

Su-ch6u  (Kan-su)  ; 150. 

Su  Ts’in,  statesman  : pupil  of  Kui- 
ku-tzi,  285 ; his  career,  308-314. 

Sui  dynasty : classification  of  im- 
perial library  of,  imitated  by 
Chinese  writers,  306. 

Sui-jon : the  Prometheus  of  the 

Chinese,  6,  329 ; predecessor  of 
Fu-hi,  8. 

Summer,  Mandarin  of  (hia-kuan)  : 
113,  119-123. 

Sun-tzi:  see  Sun  Wu. 

Sun  Wu,  military  leader  and  philoso- 
pher : 234. 

Sun,  the  : as  an  object  of  worship,  79. 

Sung-shi:  131. 

Sung-shu:  129,  130. 

Superior  Man,  the : according  to 

Confucius,  239,  254,  255 ; ac- 
cording to  Lau-tzi,  240. 

Ta-hio  (“The  Great  Learning”)  : 
26,  note  1,  254. 

Ta-ki : the  Emperor  Ch6u-sin’s  con- 
sort, brought  away  as  a captive, 
54;  her  licentiousness  and  cru- 
elty, 56-57 ; did  not  invent 
punishment  of  roasting,  57, 
note  1 ; ruled  her  husband,  56, 
65 ; her  death,  65. 

Ta-tsai  (=  prime  minister)  : 110-111. 

Ta-ts’in  (Syria)  : 19,  148. 

Ta-yii : see  Yu. 


Taboo  of  names : not  known  among 
the  Hrms,  168. 

T’ai-hau : see  Fu-hi. 

T’ai-kia,  the  Emperor  : 47,  330. 

T’ai-k’ang,  the  Emperor ; 39,  330. 

T’ai-kong,  the  Emperor:  48,  330. 

T’ai-kung  Shang : invested  with 

Ts’i  by  Wu-wang,  339. 

T’ai-m6u,  the  Emperor  : 48,  330. 

T’ai-po  : legendary  ancestor  of  princes 
of  Wu,  347. 

T’ai-shan  : sacred  mountain  in  Shan- 
tung, 9,  122. 

T’ai-wang  : see  T’an-fu. 

T’ai-yiian : Huns  driven  back  as 

far  as,  under  Siian-wang,  160, 
161 ; part  of  the  state  of  Tsin, 
212. 

Tan,  Duke  of  Ch6u  : see  Chou-kung. 

Tan-yang  : old  capital  of  the  state 
of  Ch’u,  190. 

T’an-fu  (T’ai-wang,  or  Ku-kimg)  : 
Won-wang’s  grandfather,  57-58, 
331 ; as  a vassal  of  the  Huns 
is  caused  by  their  oppressions 
to  emigrate,  57-58,  68-69,  169 ; 
as  chief  ancestor  of  the  Ch6u 
emperors  is  addressed  by  Ch6u- 
kung  in  prayer,  103 ; his  eldest 
son,  T’ai-po,  supposed  ancestor 
of  sovereigns  of  Wu,  347. 

T’ang,  “the  Completer,”  or  “the 
Successful  ” : see  Ch’ong-t’ang. 

T’ang-shu:  96. 

Tangutans  {K’iang)  : derive  their 

origin  from  the  San-miau  tribe, 
originally  in  central  China,  86, 
196 ; win  battle  against  Siian- 
wang,  158. 

Tartarization  of  Chinese  culture : 
268-273. 

Tau,  King  of  Ch’u  : 274,  337. 

Tau  (“the  word”):  in  the  Tau-to- 
king,  239 ; Professor  Giles  on, 
300. 

Tau-to-king : see  Lau-tzi. 

Tauism  : an  indigenous  religion,  238  ; 
see  also  Tauists. 

Tauists : cultivate  Si-wang-mu  leg- 
ends, 146 ; Confucianists  and, 
how  differing,  299 ; see  also 
Chuang-tzi;  Kuan  Yin;  Kui- 


INDEX 


377 


KU-TzI,  Lau-tzI;  Lie-tzi;  Won- 

TZ'l. 

T’au  Hung-king,  scholar  : 308. 

T’au-t’i4,  the  monster : a native 

invention,  84-87 ; held  to  be 
identical  with  San-miau  tribe, 
85 ; possibly  the  Tibetan  mastiff, 

87. 

Taxes : amount  of,  fixed  by  Man- 
darin of  Heaven,  114;  collected 
by  Mandarin  of  Earth,  116;  on 
salt  and  iron,  203-205  ; on  agri- 
culture, 296 ; systems  of  raising, 
297-298. 

Ten  Stems ; see  Cyclical  charac- 
ters. 

Terrestrial  emperors  : 5,  329. 

Textures  of  cotton  (vegetable  fiber) 
and  silk : 122. 

Thunder  pattern  {lei-won)  : derived 
from  hieroglj’phic  for  “ thunder,  ” 

88,  89 ; used  as  an  ornament  for 
filling-in  purposes ; symbolic 
meaning,  89. 

Thurdcz,  John  of : his  list  of  King 
Attila’s  ancestors,  185,  190. 

Ti  (northern  barbarians,  Hims)  : 168 ; 
referred  to  in  Tso-chuan,  185, 
188;  Duke  Won  of  Ts’i  among 
the,  213. 

Ti-chi,  the  Emperor  ; 25,  26,  329. 

Ti-huang : see  Terrestrial  em- 

perors. 

Ti-k’i,  the  Emperor  : 39,  330. 

Ti-k’u,  the  Emperor : 25,  329 ; 

father  of  Yau,  ancestor  of  Shang 
and  Ch6u  emperors,  25. 

Ti-kui,  the  Emperor  ; see  Kie. 

Ti-siang,  the  Emperor  : 41,  330. 

T’iau-chi  (Chaldea)  ; 148. 

Tibetans ; supposed  descendants  of 
the  San-miau  tribe,  86. 

T’i6n,  the,  family : usurpers  in  Ts’i, 
273,  339,  340. 

T’i4n  Ch’ang,  minister  in  Ts’i ; 273. 

T’i6n  Ho,  usurper  in  Ts’i : 273,  340. 

T’i^n^chvrlciau  (=  Roman  Catholi- 
cism) : 238. 

T’iin-huang : see  Heavenly  em- 

perors. 

T’i^kiian;  see  Heaven,  Mandarin 

OF. 


T’iin-tzi:  see  Son  of  Heaven. 

Tin : produced  in  Yang-ch6u  prov- 
ince, 120. 

Ting,  Duke  of  Lu  : 244-246,  341. 

Ting-wang,  the  Emperor  : 220,  332. 

Tithe,  levied  on  harvests : 297-298. 

Tonjukuk,  inscription  of : 184,  note 

1. 

T’ong,  the  state  of  : 290. 

Tortoise  shells : as  instruments  of 
divination,  83,  102,  103,  118. 

Traffic,  land  and  water : regulated 
under  Huang-ti,  22. 

Translation  of  poetry  and  philo- 
sophical texts : 239-240. 

Traveler,  the  Great  and  the  Small ; 
124-125. 

Travehng  philosophers : 285. 

Tribute  (kung)  : 112. 

Tripods,  the  Nine  : see  Nine  Tripods, 

THE. 

Tsai  Yii  : see  Tzi-o. 

Ts’ai,  the  state  of : Duke  Huan  of 
Ts’i’s  expedition  against,  208; 
its  first  prince  a brother  of  Wu- 
wang ; princes  of,  345-346 ; 
annexed  by  Ch’u,  346. 

Ts’ang-ki6,  state  historian  : reputed 
inventor  of  the  art  of  writing, 
20-21. 

Ts’au,  the  state  of  : on  route  from 
Ts’i  to  Ch’u,  214;  Wu-wang  in- 
vests his  brother  Chon-to  with, 
343 ; princes  of,  343-344 ; an- 
nexed by  Sung,  344. 

Ts’i,  the  state  of  : becomes  powerful 
under  P’ing-wang,  178;  as  an 
inland  state  could  not  extend, 
188 ; rise  of,  to  great  power ; its 
Duke  Huan,  first  of  the  “Five 
Leaders,’’  and  his  minister  Kuan- 
tzi,  201-211,  217-218,  295;  its 
salt  and  iron  industries,  204— 
205 ; Duke  Won  of  Tsin  as  an 
exile  in,  213-214 ; on  side  of 
Tsin  in  war  with  Ch’u,  217 ; 
under  Duke  Huan’s  successors, 
218-219 ; Duke  Chau  of  Lu  an 
exile  in,  with  Confucius,  243- 
244 ; its  court  had  good  music, 
243 ; its  jealousy  of  Confucius’ 
good  government  in  Lu,  246; 


378 


INDEX 


one  of  the  “Seven  Heroes” 
states,  266 ; change  of  dynasty, 
the  T’i^n  family,  273 ; assumes 
title  of  “King,”  but  remains 
loyal  to  emperor,  275,  315 ; 
princes  of,  known  for  luxury, 
277,  note  1 ; Mencius  in,  283, 
287 ; plans  conquest  of  Yen, 
287 ; joins  confederation  against 
Ts’in,  310;  attacks  Chau,  313; 
Su  Ts’in  assassinated  in,  314 ; 
Mong-ch’ang-kiin,  native  of, 
takes  service  in  Ts’in  and  re- 
turns to,  317 ; the  title  of 
“Emperor”  proposed  for  King 
Min  of,  318-319 ; conquers 
Sung,  319 ; suffers  defeat  by 
Yen  and  its  allies,  319 ; annexed 
by  Ts’in,  328,  340;  princes  of, 
339-340. 

Ts’ir-hiung : the  seven  powerful  con- 
tending states,  266. 

Ts’Un-han-shu:  66. 

Ts’i6n-m6u;  battle-field,  near  the 
present  Liau-ch6u,  Shan-si,  158. 

Tsin,  the  state  of  : becomes  powerful 
under  P’ing-wang,  178;  causes 
of  its  growth,  182,  188,  212 ; its 
situation,  183;  its  Duke  Won 
one  of  the  “Five  Leaders,”  206, 
211-217,  219;  a son  of  Wu- 
wang’s  invested  with,  212,  266, 
334 ; its  Duke  Hi6n,  212 ; de- 
feats Ch’u  in  the  battle  of 
Ch’ong-p’u,  216;  Chau  Ts’ui 
and  Chau  Tun  ministers  in, 
220,  269 ; defeated  by  Ch’u, 
223 ; six  grandees  of,  wrangling 
for  supremacy,  263 ; the  fami- 
hes  of  Han,  Chau,  and  Wei 
become  powerful  in,  263  ; break- 
ing up  of,  into  three  states,  264 ; 
its  former  territory  finally  an- 
nexed by  Ts’in,  328,  335-336; 
princes  of,  334-335. 

Ts’in,  the  state  of  : Duke  Mu  of,  held 
to  be  the  Mu-wang  of  the  Si- 
wang-mu  legend,  151 ; Fei-tzi, 
a dealer  in  horses,  elevated  to 
rank  of  prince  of,  153 ; becomes 
powerful  under  P’ing-wang,  178 ; 
causes  of  its  growth,  182,  188 ; 


its  situation,  183 ; its  Duke  Mu 
one  of  the  “Five  Leaders,”  206, 
219 ; interferes  with  succession 
in  Tsin,  213,  215;  on  side  of 
Tsin  in  war  with  Ch’u,  216;  one 
of  the  “ Seven  Heroes  ” states, 
266;  its  boundaries  constantly 
extending,  266-267 ; non-Chi- 
nese character  of,  267-268,  275; 
common  descent  of  its  princes 
with  those  of  Chau,  269 ; claims 
hegemony  among  Contending 
States ; regarded  as  barbarian 
country  by  Chinese,  275  ; Chang 
I minister  in,  286,  312 ; Ts’in 
and  Anti-Ts’in,  the  main  politi- 
cal factions  in  fourth  century 
B.C.,  309 ; sends  Chang  I on  a 
successful  mission  to  Ch’u,  312, 
315 ; confederation  against,  bro- 
ken up  by  Kung-sun  Yen,  313; 
Chang  I recalled  to ; conquers 
Shu  (Ssi-ch’uan),  314;  strongest 
state  long  before  being  styled 
kingdom  in  325  b.c.,  314 ; 

Kings  Hui-won  and  Wu  of,  316 ; 
Chang  I leaves,  for  want  of  ap- 
preciation; war  with  Han,  316; 
King  Chau-siang,  317-325 ; 
regency  of  Queen  Dowmger, 
317-320;  Wei  Jan,  commander 
in,  317 ; and  chancellor,  318- 
320;  reverses  in  war  with  Ts’i, 
Han,  and  Wei,  317-318 ; Po  K’i, 
commander  in,  318-322 ; wins 
great  battle  at  I-k’ii4 ; title  of 
“Emperor  ” proposed  for  king  of, 
318;  defeats  Chau  and  Ch’u, 
conquers  city  of  Ying  and  de- 
stroys I-ling;  Wei  Jan’s  rule  in, 
overthrown,  319;  King  Chau- 
siang  sole  regent  with  Fan  Tsii 
as  chancellor,  320-323 ; de- 
feats Chau  at  Shang-tang,  321 ; 
the  “ Four  Nobles  ” work  against, 
321-326;  besieges  Han-tan  and 
is  defeated,  322 ; loses  its  great- 
est general  by  Fan  Tsii’s  jeal- 
ousy, 322-323  ; Prince  I-jon  of, 
and  Lii  Pu-wei,  323-328 ; an- 
nexes imperial  dominion  and 
sacred  tripods,  325 ; annexes 


INDEX 


379 


Han ; King  Chau-siang  offers 
sacrifice  to  Shang-ti  in  lieu  of 
emperor,  326 ; its  final  struggle 
for  supreme  power  with  Lii 
Pu-wei  as  prime  minister,  327- 
328 ; deposes  last  prince  of  the 
Ch6u  dynasty  and  annexes 
federal  states;  Chong  (=  Shi- 
huang-ti),  king  of,  328;  princes 
of,  332-334. 

Ising,  Duke  of  Tsin : loses  his 

throne  to  the  princes  of  Wei, 
Han,  and  Chau,  335. 

Tsing  : personal  name  of  Suan-wang, 
157,  159. 

Tsing  (“well”),  the  : system  of  taxa- 
tion, 296-297. 

Ts’ing-ch6u  province  : 121. 

Tsong  Ts’an,  disciple  of  Confucius  : 
author  of  Hiau-king,  249 ; teacher 
of  Wu  K’i,  274. 

T so-chuan,  commentary  on  the 
Ch’un-ts’iu:  contains  an  expla- 
nation of  the  name  T’au-t’i6,  85 ; 
principal  source  for  the  Ch’un- 
ts’iu  period,  179-181,  182,  197, 
253 ; on  foreign  tribes  (Jung, 
Ti,  etc.),  185,  187 ; describes 
battle  with  foreign  tribes,  187- 
188;  contains  history  of  the 
“Five  Leaders,”  206;  Ch’ong- 
wang’s  mistake  as  to  duration 
of  dynasty  reproduced  in,  sup- 
ports trustworthiness  of,  222 ; 
extends  beyond  Confucius  ’ death, 
262. 

Tso-k’iu  Ming : supposed  author  of 
the  T so-chuan,  179. 

Tsu-i,  the  Emperor  : 49,  331. 

Tsung-hong,  the  term  : 307. 

Tsung-li-yamen,  the:  111. 

Tsung-mu : 133,  note  1,  148-149. 

Tu,  brother  of  Wu-wang  : invested 
with  Ts’ai,  345. 

Tuan-mu  Shu : 277. 

Tuan-mu  Tz’i : see  Tzi'-kung. 

Tung-ch6u,  the  “Eastern  Ch6u”: 
so-called  since  P’ing-wang,  179. 

Tung-ch6u-kun : the  last  nominal 

regent  of  the  Ch6u  dominion, 
325,  326,  332. 

Tung-kuan-k’au-kung-ki;  125. 


Tung-tu : eastern  capital  of  Ch6u 
emperors,  177. 

T ’ung-kien-kang-mu : 264—266,  268, 
326. 

Tiirk,  the  Turks  of  Central  Asia : 
identical  with  the  T’u-kii6  of  the 
Chinese,  184,  note  1. 

Turkestan,  Eastern  : 18-19,  91,  146- 
150,  151. 

Turkish  : the  language  of  the  Huns, 
66,  70,  184,  note  1. 

Turkish  word,  the  oldest,  on  record  : 
see  King-lu. 

Twelve  Branches : see  Cyclical 

CHARACTERS. 

Tzi  (=  viscount)  : 98. 

Tzi-ch’an,  the  prudent  minister  of 
Chong  : 232. 

Tzi-chi-t’ung-kiin:  see  T’ung-kien- 

KANG-MU. 

Tzi-kung : supposed  author  of  the 
YuS-tsiie-shu,  234;  disciple  of 
Confucius,  249. 

Tzi-lu,  Confucius’  favorite  disciple : 
248-249. 

Tzi-o,  disciple  of  Confucius  : 250. 

Tzi-shu-pai-chung,  a collection  of 
philosophical  texts  : 306. 

Tzi-yu  : see  Tsong  Ts’an. 

Tzi-yuan,  disciple  of  Confucius : 
249. 

Uigurs  (Kau-kii)  : described  by  the 
Chinese  as  offshoots  of  the 
Hiung-nu,  184,  note  1 ; the  T’ung- 
kiin-kang-mu  translated  into 
their  language,  264-265. 

Uniforms  : devised  by  Huang-ti,  23  ; 
embroidered  beasts  and  birds 
on,  introduced  by  Shau-hau,  24  ; 
of  the  Sons  of  the  Empire,  117 ; 
of  soldiers  in  war,  165. 

Varnish:  121. 

Vegetarian  diet  in  primeval  times  : 6. 

Virtue  rewarded  in  future  fife  : 82. 

Wai-jon,  the  Emperor:  49,  330. 

Wai-shi  (“Historian  of  foreign  na- 
tions and  ancient  rulers”)  : 125. 

Wai-vm-pu,  the  Board  of  Foreign 
Affairs,  111,  note  1. 


380 


INDEX 


Wall,  the  Great : a comparatively 
modern,  structure,  37,  77. 

Wang  Fu,  archaeologist : 73. 

Wang  Ho,  general  of  Ts’in  ; 322. 

Wang  Hii  : see  Kui-ku-tzi. 

War:  Board  of,  113,  119-123; 

people’s  share  in  decision  on 
defensive,  124;  methods  and 
outfit  of,  162-166 ; May  and 
June  the  usual  season  for,  164- 
165 ; prisoners  of,  punished  as 
rebels  by  cutting  off  left  ear, 
165,  169 ; Chinese  and  Hunnic 
methods  of,  compared,  166,  187 ; 
see  also  Army  ; Battles  ; Char- 
iots ; Horses  ; Huns  ; Hunting  ; 
Weapons. 

Watters,  T. : on  Tzi-ch’an,  233. 

Weapons : bows,  arrows,  swords, 

and  lances  ascribed  to  Huang-ti, 
22 ; hieroglyphics  for,  occur  on 
vessels  of  the  Shang  dynasty,  75 ; 
alloys  of  bronze  weapons  pre- 
scribed according  to  the  Chdu-li, 
126 ; same  weapons  used  in  war 
as  in  hunting,  162,  164 ; practice 
of  archery,  165 ; of  the  Huns, 
168 ; hatchets  made  of  iron  in 
seventh  century  b.c.,  204 ; swords 
of  bronze  and  iron,  235 ; during 
the  stone,  jade,  bronze,  and  iron 
ages,  236. 

Weaving : see  Dress. 

Wei,  the  River  : 54,  122. 

Wei,  the  state  of  (Wei  of  Tsin,  also 
called  Liang)  : beginnings,  263 ; 
recognized  as  a feudal  state,  264  ; 
one  of  the  “Seven  Heroes” 
states,  266 ; supports  the  usurp- 
er T’i6n  Ho  as  Duke  of  Ts’i, 
273;  Wu  K’i  takes  service  in, 
274 ; Chang  I,  a native  of,  and 
minister  in,  286 ; King  Hui  of, 
converses  with  Mencius  on 
matters  of  government,  287 ; 
joins  confederation  against  Ts’in, 
310;  Chang  I returns  to,  312; 
Kung-sun  Y en,  a native  of,  per- 
suades his  king  to  attack  Chau, 
313 ; Chang  I chancellor  of,  314 ; 
kingdom  since  370  b.c.,  315 ; 
defeated  by  Ts’in  in  battle  of 


I-k’ii6,  318 ; Fan  Tsii  a native 
of,  320;  Prince  Wu-ki  of,  321; 
at  the  head  of  five  states  tries 
to  check,  but  finally  is  annexed 
by,  Ts’in,  328,  335;  princes  of, 
335. 

Wei,  the  state  of  [not  to  be  con- 
founded with  Wei  of  Tsin,  273] : 
bad  treatment  in,  of  Duke 
Won  of  Tsin,  213 ; Duke 
Ling  of,  his  lascivious  wife  and 
Confucius,  246-247 ; Confucius’ 
second  sojourn  in,  248;  Wu  K’i, 
military  leader,  a native  of, 
273-274 ; its  princes  reduced  in 
rank,  315;  Wu-wang’s  brother 
Fong  invested  with,  346 ; only 
state  surviving  creation  of  Shi- 
huang-ti’s  empire,  347 ; princes 
of,  346-347. 

Wei,  Viscount  of  : see  Wei-tzi. 

Wei  Jan,  commander  and  chancel- 
lor in  Ts’in:  317-320;  plana 
coronation  of  King  of  Ts’in  as 
emperor,  318 ; fears  itinerant 
politicians  and  excludes  them 
from  Ts’in,  320 ; his  fall,  319-320. 

Wei-lid-wang,  the  Emperor : 263- 

273,  332. 

Wei-tzi  (Ki)  : joins  Wu-wang’s 

forces,  63 ; appointed  prince  of 
Sung,  106,  341-342. 

Weights  and  measures : system  of, 
derived  from  efforts  in  construct- 
ing musical  instruments,  22,  23. 

Western  Ch6u  : see  Si-chou. 

Winter,  Mandarin  of  (tung-kuari)  ; 
113,  125-126. 

Wives  : rank  seventh  in  population, 

110. 

Wizards,  court : duties  include  the 
denunciation  of  subjects  heard 
speaking  disrespectfully  of  sov- 
ereign, 155. 

Wolves,  wliite  : presented  as  tribute 
to  Mu-wang,  169. 

Woman’s  position  and  duties  ac- 
cording to  the  mother  of  Men- 
cius : 283-284. 

Won,  Duke  of  T’ong  : 290. 

Won,  Duke  of  Tsin  ( = Ch’ung-ir)  : 
tliird  of  the  “Five  Leaders,’! 


INDEX 


381 


206,  211-217,  335;  assists  em- 
peror in  fighting  the  Jung  bar- 
barians, 219 ; Chau  Tsui,  one 
of  his  partisans,  shared  his  exile, 
213,  220,  269. 

W 6n-tzi  (“the  Philosopher  Won”): 
306-307. 

Won-wang,  Duke  of  Ch6u : inci- 

dents of  his  fife  quoted  from 
Bamboo  Books,  53-55 ; his 
career  as  Duke  of  Ch6u,  57—62, 
331 ; his  sons,  58 ; remonstrates 
against  Ch6u-sLn’s  cruelty;  his 
imprisonment,  and  authorsliip  of 
the  I-king,  59  ; his  rehabilitation 
and  death,  62 ; serves  the  Kun 
barbarians,  68 ; defeats  them, 
70,  169  ; builds  his  capital  Fong, 
99 ; Ch6u-kung’s  prayer  ad- 
dressed to,  103 ; offered  a white 
pheasant  by  foreign  tribe,  128 ; 
greatly  admired  by  Mu-wang, 
144. 

Woodmen  (foresters)  : how  ranking 
in  population,  110. 

Works,  Board  of  : 113,  125-126. 

World,  the  it’iin-hia)  = China  : 112. 

Writing,  art  of : knot-WTiting  as- 

cribed to  Sui-jon,  6 ; replaced 
by  hieroglj’phics  under  Fu-hi, 
9;  Ts’ang-ki6  imitates  birds’ 
footprints,  20-21 ; oldest  ma- 
■‘erials  : bamboo  boards,  brush, 
and  varnish,  20,  21,  50;  com- 
plaints to  emperor  written  on 
boards,  31 ; edicts  on  bamboo 
tablets,  163 ; no  writing  among 
Huns,  168. 

Wu,  King  of  Ch’u  : see  HrcTN’G  T’ung. 

Wu,  King  of  Ts’in  : 316,  333. 

Wu  (Foochow)  : eastern  capital  of 
the  state  of  Ch’u,  322. 

Wu,  the  state  of : situation,  227 ; 
its  king,  Ho-lu,  removes  capital 
to  Soochow,  233 ; annexed  by 
YM,  234,  261-262,  348 ; T’ai-po, 
son  of  T’an-fu,  supposed  an- 
cestor of  sovereigns  of,  347 ; 
Princes  of,  347-348. 

Wu-chi-shan  tombs : stone  sculp- 

tures of,  contain  image  of  Fu-hi, 

2. 


Wu-chung  tribes : 187. 

Wu-ki,  Prince  of  Wei  : see  Sin-lixg- 

KUX. 

WuK’i,  philosopher,  military  leader 
and  minister  : 274. 

Wti-king  (“Five  Canons”)  : 251-253. 

Wu-kong,  Chou-sin’s  son  : appointed 
King  of  Corea,  96 ; intrigues 
against  Ch6u-kung,  104 ; sup- 
ports rebellion,  but  is  made 
prisoner  and  killed,  104,  106. 

Wu-ling,  King  of  Chau:  336;  wears 
Tartar  dress  and  introduces 
cavalry,  272,  316. 

Wtt^lung:  see  Five  Dragons. 

Wu-pa  (=  the  “ Five  Leaders”)  : 206. 

Wu-sii : see  Chau  Siaxg-tzi. 

Wu-tau-tzi,  artist : 149. 

Wu-ti,  the  Han  Emperor  : 146. 

Wu-ti:  see  Five  Rulers,  the. 

Wu-ting  (Kau-tsung),  the  Emperor  : 
53,  331. 

AVu-ting,  the  Emperor : T’ai-kia’s 
son,  48,  330. 

Wu-tzi:  see  AA’u  K’l. 

TVvr-yu&-ch’un-ts’iu : 234. 

Wu-wang : Duke  of  Ch6u  and  first 
emperor  of  the  Ch6u  djmasty, 
second  son  of  Won-wang,  58, 
331 ; liberates  his  father  by  a 
ruse,  62 ; assembles  army  to 
fight  Ch6u-sin,  explaining  his 
motives  in  several  speeches,  63- 
65 ; defeats  Ch6u-sin,  65,  169 ; 
as  King  of  Ch6u,  95-103,  331 ; 
his  title,  96-97  ; secures  posses- 
sion of  the  Nine  Tripods,  98, 
221 ; appoints  descendants  of 
old  emperors  and  his  brothers 
fief-holders,  99-100;  his  illness, 
102-103 ; greatly  admired  by 
Mu-wang,  144;  the  unequaled 
sovereign  of  the  Ch6u  dynasty, 
178;  one  of  his  sons  invested 
with  Tsin,  212,  334 ; invests 
T’ai-kung  Shang  with  Ts’i,  339 ; 
Duke  Hu  with  Ch’on,  343;  his 
brother  Chon-to  with  Ts’au, 
343 ; his  brother  Tu  first  Prince 
of  Ts’ai,  346. 

Wu-wet  (“non-action,”  “inaction”) : 
Lau-tzi  on,  239,  301. 


382 


INDEX 


Wylie,  A. ; on  deviation  of  mag- 
netic needle,  131;  on  the  Mu- 
t’iin-tzi-chuan,  145;  on  the 
philosopher  Yii,  192,  note  3; 
on  the  T’ung-kien-kang-mu,  265, 
note  1. 

Yang-chou  province : 120. 

Yang  Chu,  the  philosopher  : placed  in 
contrast  with  Ch6u-kung  by 
Mencius,  138 ; his  teachings 
based  on  egotism,  276-279 ; 
spurious  chapter  in  Chuang-tz'i 
quotes  his  views,  303. 

Yang-tzi  or  Kiang  River  : its  length, 
36-37;  its  name,  120;  Chau- 
yang  crossing  the,  143,  189 ; 
state  of  King  on  the,  171. 

Yau,  the  Emperor : son  of  Ti-k’u, 
25,  329 ; his  character  described 
in  the  Shu-king,  29,  251 ; the 
deluge  during  his  reign,  31,  35; 
taxation  under,  297. 

Yau  and  Shun : the  most  popular 
names  in  Chinese  history,  29 ; 
held  up  as  models  of  good  rulers ; 
guided  by  the  advice  of  their 
ministers,  33 ; legendary  crea- 
tions, 55-56;  ancestor  worship 
ascribed  to,  81 ; descendants  of, 
appointed  fief-holders  under  Wu- 
wang,  99;  wall-painting  repre- 
senting, 243 ; as  viewed  by 
Yang  Chu,  278;  Mencius  a 
believer  in,  288. 

Yau  Hing,  the  Emperor  : 130,  135. 

Ye-su-kiau  (=  Protestantism)  : 238. 

Y ellow  River : overflow  of,  see 

Deluge  ; its  length,  36  ; causes 
change  of  capitals,  49,  52 ; runs 
into  Gulf  of  Chi-U,  122;  re- 
puted source  of,  in  Karakorum 
range,  146 ; valley  of,  hunting 
ground  of  Chinese  and  indig- 
enous hordes,  162. 

Yen,  Duke  of  Sung : confirmed  as 
king,  315,  342. 

Yen,  mother  of  Confucius  : 229. 

Yen,  the  state  of : causes  of  its 
growth,  188 ; relieved  by  Duke 
Huan  of  Ts’i  from  attacks  of 
Shan-jung,  207 ; one  of  the 


“Seven  Heroes”  states,  266; 
occupied  by  Ts’i,  287 ; its  duke 
persuaded  by  Su  Ts’in  to  join 
confederation  against  Ts’in, 
310;  Su  Ts’in  minister  in,  314; 
kingdom  since  332  b.c.,  315; 
forms  coalition  against  Ts’i; 
victorious  by  its  general  Yo  I, 
319 ; annexed  by  Ts’in,  339 ; 
Princes  of,  338-339. 

Yen-fa:  see  Salt. 

Yen  Hui  : see  Tzi-tuan. 

Yen-ti : see  Shon-nung. 

Yin  and  Y ang  : the  female  and  male 
principles  in  Chinese  natural 
pliilosophy,  60-61. 

Yin  d5masty  : see  Shang  dynasty. 

Yin,  Prince  of : generalissimo  imder 
Chung-k’ang,  39. 

Yin  Ki-fu  : general  under  Suan-wane, 
159-161. 

Yin-ti  epoch  : 5,  6,  329. 

Ying  ; from  704  to  248  B.c.,  capital 
of  the  state  of  Ch’u,  the  present 
King-chou-fu,  190,  319. 

Yo  : a sacred  mountain,  122. 

Yo  Chong,  disciple  of  Mencius : 
prime  minister  in  Lu,  287. 

Yo  I,  general  of  Yen  ; defeats  army 
of  Ts’i,  319. 

Yii,  the  Emperor  : 32-38,  330 ; sup- 
posed descendant  of  Huang- 
ti,  33 ; his  engineering  works 
exaggerated,  34-38 ; his  suc- 
cessors, 38-44,  330 ; stone  in- 
scription known  as  “The  Tablet 
of  Yii,”  jade  inscriptions  and 
the  Nine  Tripods  of  Yii,  90,  98, 
221,  325 ; the  Huns  calling  their 
princes  descendants  of,  167, 
191  ; his  time  considered  the 
beginning  of  the  bronze  age 
in  China,  326 ; iron  and  steel 
being  mentioned  among  his 
tribute  articles  is  an  anachro- 
nism, 237 ; as  represented  in 
Shu-king,  251 ; taxation  under, 
297. 

Yii’s  successors:  38-44,  330. 

Yii-ch6u  province : 121. 

Yii-hiung : ancestor  of  the  sover- 

eigns of  Ch’u,  190,  336;  instruc- 


INDEX 


383 


tor  to  Won-wang;  supposed 
author  of  the  oldest  book  in 
Chinese  hterature,  59,  note  1, 
192,  306. 

Yu-kung  (“The  Tribute  of  Yii”)  : 
34—38,  56-57 ; its  geography 
resembles  that  of  the  Chdu-li, 
122-123;  Cliina  called  “Middle 
Regions”  in,  137. 

Yii-tzi:  59,  note  1,  192,  306;  see 
also  Yij-HIUNG. 

Yu  (“to  have”)  : used  in  forming 
fief  names,  5,  17,  32. 

Yu^ch’au  (“The  Nest-builders”)  : 
5,  6,  329. 

Yu-hia : title  of  the  Emperor  Yii, 
32. 

Yu-hiung : title  of  the  Emperor 

Huang-ti,  17,  32. 

Yu-h6u : feudal  lord  imder  Ti-k’i, 
39. 

Yu-k’iung : see  Hdu-i. 

Yu-li  : city  near  the  present  Chang- 
to-fu,  54,  59. 


Yu-shi  : father  of  the  Emperor  Ki6’s 
paramour,  43. 

Yu-wang,  the  Emperor : 169,  171— 
177,  332. 

Yu-yii;  title  of  the  Emperor  Shim, 
32. 

Yimg-ch6u  province  : 122. 

Yung-ki,  the  Emperor : 48,  330. 

Yiian  Yiian : statesman  and  archse- 
ologist,  74. 

Yiian-wang,  the  Emperor  : 261-262, 
332. 

Yii6,  the  state  of : situation,  227 ; 
annexes  Wu,  234 ; works  on  its 
history  and  antiquities,  234 ; 
conquered  by  Ch’u,  314,  348; 
mentioned  in  Tso-chuan;  Princes 
of,  348. 

Yii6-ch’ang  : tribes  in  the  south  of 
Tungking,  127. 

Yu6-chi,  or  Indoscythians : 271. 

Yu6-tsue-shu;  234. 

Zeuss,  Kaspar : Lx,  271. 


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